Comprehensive analysis of species diversity of eukaryotic microorganisms inhabiting the forests in Japan

2018 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 15K18720
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (B)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Forest science
• Research Institution: Institute of Physical and Chemical Research
• Principal Investigator: Rikiya Endoh 国立研究開発法人理化学研究所, バイオリソース研究センター, 開発研究員 (90634494)
• Project Period (FY): 2015-04-01 – 2019-03-31
• Keywords: 生物多様性 / カルチャーコレクション

Outline of Final Research Achievements

This project has been aimed at developing a new method analyzing fungal diversity in the forest environment in Japan. Mock fungal community was prepared, and then analyzed by using a high-throughput DNA sequencer MinION. Accuracy of the nucleotide sequences obtained from MinION were too low to count up number of species inhabiting in forest environment, leading to a conclusion that MinION is not suitable for evaluation of species diversity. Accordingly, combination of a recently-launched library preparation kit LoopSeq supplied by Loop Genomics Ltd. and sequencing by MiSeq appeared promising, as the procedure would yield very accurate nucleotide sequences of ca. 1500 bp in length. High-throughput evaluation of species diversity would be achieved by using this methodology in the future.

Free Research Field

微生物資源学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

自然が豊かな我が国には、膨大な種数におよぶ微生物が生息していると考えられる。これらは未利用の資源ともとらえられ、その多様性を把握することは微生物資源を利活用する可能性を広げることにつながる。本課題で取り組んだ、高速DNAシーケンサーを用いて正確性が高く長い塩基配列を取得する手法を活用することで、我が国の森林環境が擁する微生物多様性についてより正確な知見が今後蓄積していくものと期待される。