Diversity and distribution of mating types in Lentinula edodes and mating type preference in domesticated strains

Mating type of Lentinula edodes is determined by two unlinked genetic loci, A and B. To better understand mating behavior of L. edodes, we investigated variations in mating type genes in129 dikaryotic strains collected from East Asia. Through sequence analysis of A locus, we discovered that hypervariable region spanning N-term of HD2-intergenic region-N-term of HD1 could represent A mating type. Mating and hypervariable region analyses revealed 70 unique A mating types: 27 from 98 cultivated strains, 53 from 31 wild strains, and 10 commonly found. It was also revealed that only a few A mating type alleles such as A1, A4, A5, and A7 were prevalent in cultivated strains. Contrarily, A mating type in wild strains was highly diverse: 23 unique A alleles were discovered in small mountainous area in Korean peninsula, suggesting rapid evolution of A mating type in nature. The B locus was assessed by allelic variations in pheromone (PHB) and pheromone receptor (RCB) pairs which constituted subloci Ba and Bb. Sequence analyses and mating assay revealed 5 alleles of RCB1 with 9 associated PHBs in Ba sublocus and 3 alleles of RCB2 with 5 associated PHBs in Bb sublocus. Each RCB was primarily associated with two PHBs. Each PHB-RCB pair was always discovered as a distinct unit. This allowed us to propose 15 B mating types via combinations of five Ba and three Bb subloci. Further investigation on 129 strains confirmed that the B locus, unlike the A locus, was indeed restricted to 15 mating types. Thus, the total number of mating types became 1,050 in L. edodes through a combination of 70 A and 15 B. This number will further increase because of rapid diversification of A mating type. Our findings provide a comprehensive and practical knowledge on mating behaviors of L. edodes.