• Korean Journal of Environmental Biology
• /
• v.30 no.1
• /
• pp.54-63
• /
• 2012

This study characterizes three $Anabaena$ strains and 5 $Trichormus$ strains isolated from Korean waters and 3 $Anabaena$ $flos-aquae$ strains procured from the UTEX based on morphological features and molecular analyses. The $Anabaena$ and $Trichormus$ isolates were morphologically assigned to $A.$ $variabilis$ K$\ddot{u}$tzing and $T.$ $variabilis$(K$\ddot{u}$tzing ex Bornet et Flahault) Kom$\acute{a}$rek et Anagnostidis, respectively. The $Anabaena$ and $Trichormus$ strains differed significantly in the mean length of their vegetative cells. The 16S rRNA genes from the $Anabaena$ strains showed a 100% identity to that from $A.$ $variabilis$ ATCC 29413, while the 16S rRNA genes from the $Trichormus$ strains showed a 99.9% identity to that from $T.$ $variabilis$ GREIFSWALD. The overall topology was in agreement for the 16S rRNA gene and $cpcBA$-IGS trees in the both tree-constructing methods. In a neighbor-joining tree based on the 16S rRNA gene, the 3 $Anabaena$ strains were asso-ciated with $A.$ $variabilis$, the 5 $Trichormus$ strains with $T.$ $variabilis$, and the 3 $Anabaena$ (UTEX) strains were with $Nostoc$. To date, this is the first report on $A.$ $variabilis$ and $T.$ $variabilis$ strains originating from Korea.

• Microbiology and Biotechnology Letters
• /
• v.48 no.2
• /
• pp.205-214
• /
• 2020

Cyanobacteria are microorganisms which have important roles in the nitrogen cycle due to their ability to fix nitrogen in water and soil ecosystems. They also produce valuable materials that may be used in various industries. However, some species of cyanobacteria may limit the use of water resources by causing harmful algal blooms in water ecosystems. Many culture collection depositories provide cyanobacterial strains for research, but their systematic preservation is not well-developed in Korea. In this study, we developed a method for the cryopreservation of the cyanobacteria Trichormus variabilis (syn. Anabaena variabilis), using alginate microcapsules. Two approaches were used for the experiments and their outputs were compared. One of the methods involved the cryopreservation of cells using only a cryoprotectant and the other used the cryoprotectant within microcapsules. After cryopreservation for 35 days, cells preserved with both methods were successfully regenerated from the initial 1.0 × 10⁵ cells/ml to a final concentration of 6.7 × 10⁶ cells/ml and 1.1 × 10⁷ cells/ml. Irregular T. variabilis shapes were found after 14 days of regeneration. T. variabilis internal structures were observed by transmission electron microscopy (TEM), revealing that lipid droplets were reduced after cryopreservation. The expression of the mreB gene, known to be related to cell morphology, was downregulated (54.7%) after cryopreservation. Cryopreservation using cryoprotectant alone or with microcapsules is expected to be applicable to other filamentous cyanobacteria in the future.