Isolation of a Variant Strain of Pleurotus eryngii and the Development of Specific DNA Markers to Identify the Variant Strain

A degenerated strain of Pleurotus eryngii KNR2312 was isolated from a commercial farm. Random amplified polymorphic DNA analysis performed on the genomic DNA of the normal and degenerated strains of this species revealed differences in the DNA banding pattern. A unique DNA fragment (1.7 kbp), which appeared only in the degenerated strain, was isolated and sequenced. Comparing this sequence with the KNR2312 genomic sequence showed that the sequence of the degenerated strain comprised three DNA regions that originated from nine distinct scaffolds of the genomic sequence, suggesting that chromosome-level changes had occurred in the degenerated strain. Using the unique sequence, three sets of PCR primers were designed that targeted the full length, the 5' half, and the 3' half of the DNA. The primer sets P2-1 and P2-2 yielded 1.76 and 0.97 kbp PCR products, respectively, only in the case of the degenerated strain, whereas P2-3 generated a 0.8 kbp product in both the normal and the degenerated strains because its target region was intact in the normal strain as well. In the case of the P2-1 and P2-2 sets, the priming regions of the forward and reverse primers were located at distinct genomic scaffolds in the normal strain. These two primer sets specifically detected the degenerate strain of KNR2312 isolated from various mushrooms including 10 different strains of P. eryngii, four strains of P. ostreatus, and 11 other wild mushrooms.