Genotyping of Fusarium verticillioides strains producing fumonisin B1 in feed associated with animal health problems

Abstract

Fusarium verticillioides (F. verticillioides) is not only a primary pathogen of maize, but also can causedisease in other crops such as sorghum. Pathogenicity is related to mycotoxin production such as fumonisin.In the present study, 24 isolates of F. verticillioides, which were previously identified by phenotype basedmethods, were re-identified using restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) analysis. Digestion ofthe polymerase chain reaction (PCR) products with the restriction enzyme TasI allowed identifying four nonverticillioides strains that were discarded from our study. The genetic variations among the remaining 20strains of F. verticillioides were analysed by random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD)-PCR methodwith 4 primers. Of the four primers tested, two primers produced polymorphic amplification patterns.Dendrogram for each primer indicated the distance of the strains to each other. Using primers of A, B, C andD, the isolates were divided to 8, 9, 7 and 7 groups, respectively. The results of this study indicated geneticrelationship among DNA polymorphic patterns with geographic regions and the severity of fumonisin B1(FB1) production. It seems that RAPD analysis is a suitable technique for strain typing of F. verticillioides.