From the Editor's Desk

The year 2017 mark the centennial year of birth of Late Professor S. B. Saksena of Dr. Hari Singh Gour University, Sagar (M.P.), who has been a legendry mycologist in the league of Late Professor K. S. Thind of Panjab University, Chandigarh and Late Professor C. V. Subramanian of CAS in Botany, Guindy Campus, Chennai. The present issue of Kavaka is dedicated to his memory by Mycological Society of India in honour of the significant contributions made by him to the Indian Mycology, in recognition of which, like his other contemporaries, Dr. Saksena earned international fame. Decision to this effect was taken by the executive of the Mycological Society of India, which was later ratified in the general body meeting of MSI at Jaipur. I take it as a personal pride to be associated with the commemorative volume being released by Mycological Society of India on this auspicious day of the completion of the centennial year of his birth.

As has already been intimated, our Journal is now rated at 5.30 in the NAAS rating of the Journals by National Academy of Agricultural Sciences. Recently it was listed by University Grants Commission in its approved list of Journals for publication of research articles for calculation of API score in career progression of university and college teachers.

Members are requested to submit their good research/review articles through online submission portal(http://www.kavaka.fungiindia.co.in) which can also be accessed through the official website of the Mycological Society of India (http://www.fungiindia.co.in) as well. This will help us in further improvement of the Journal rating.

I would like to express my sincere gratitude to all the contributors and the reviewers of the research articles published in this issue of Kavaka.

August 10, 2017

N. S. Atri
Editor-in-Chief
KAVAKA
Professor, Department of Botany
Punjabi University, Patiala
PIN-147 002, PUNJAB, INDIA

Front Page , Contents

KAVAKA 48(2):1-5(2017)

Professor Shyam Bahadur Saksena Birth Centennial Year Tribute

R.S. Mehrotra* and Ashok Aggarwal**

Department of Botany, Kurukshetra University, Kurukshetra (*Present
address# 263/7, Urban Estate, Kurukshetra, 136118
**Corresponding author Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
(Submitted in January, 2017; Accepted on July 5, 2017)

KAVAKA 48(2):6-10(2017)

Saksenaea vasiformis revisited after 64 years

R.S. Mehrotra* and Ashok Aggarwal**
Department of Botany, Kurukshetra University, Kurukshetra- 136119 (*Present address# 263/7, Urban Estate, Kurukshetra, 136118)
**Corresponding author Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
(Submitted in February, 2017; Accepted on July 20, 2017)

ABSTRACT

The genus Saksenaea was first discovered from India in 1953 from the forest soils of Sagar (Madhya Pradesh) by Late Professor S.B.Saksena of Dr. Hari Singh Gour University, Sagar (M.P.) and named after his Ph.D. supervisor, Prof. R.K.Saksena of Allahabad University, Allahabad. Incidentally the same fungus was discovered by Farrow around this time in 1954 from Barro Colorado Island from the soils of Panama region. The fungus was once thought to be limited in distribution has now been reported from various places from India and abroad. Because of its unique sporangial characters and non-motile spores in a columellate sporangium it was placed in the order Mucorales of the Division Zygomycota. Ellis and Hesseltine (1974) created a new family Saksenaeaceae for the genus. However, Kirk et al. (2008) have placed the genus in the family Radiomycetaceae. The taxonomic status of the family has been critically evaluated. In 1976, Azello et al published an important paper in which the fungus was found to be serious human pathogen. From 1976 to 2017, more than 50 research papers have been published on the pathogenic nature of the fungus causing severe cutaneous, sub-cutaneous and rhino-orbital-cerebral infections on humans as well as animals. In 2010, Alvarej et al. published a paper based on molecular phylogeny and proposed two more species of this genus. The paper closes with a discussion on the origin of Zygomycetes and the possible origin of Zygomycetes from Chytridiaceous ancestors such as Nowakowskiella whose sporangia look very similar to Saksenaea and also based on biochemical parameters of Chytridiomycetes and Zygomycetes.

KEY WORDS : Saksenaea, Taxonomy, pathogenic aspects and phylogeny.

KAVAKA48(2):11-20(2017)

Mycobiome:An emerging perspective in fungal biology!

Apekcha Bajpai and BN Johri
Department of Biotechnology, Barkatullah University, Bhopal-462026
Corresponding a uthor Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
(Submitted in March, 2017; Accepted on July 5, 2017)

ABSTRACT

Fungi represent an important and highly diverse group of eukaryotic microbes on earth. They play a vital role in ecosystem by driving biogeochemical cycling and nutrient uptake eventually influencing the ecological fitness. As compared to bacterial counterpart of microbiome the knowledge about fungi is still lacking from a mycobiome perspective which represents the total fungal biota in the environment. Fungi are widely distributed across all major biomes on earth. However, global fungal diversity patterns are determined by abiotic factors, geographical location, climate change and other environmental factors. With advances in high throughput sequencing platforms fungal biodiversity has been unraveled at a greater depth. This has shed light on fungal community dynamics and its contrasting features from microbiome perspectives. Additionally, a growing body of evidence suggests inter and intra-kingdom interactions and possible role of mycobiome as an integral part of the human welfare. In this article, the mycobiome is discussed in context of its association and significance in major biomes of earth.

Keywords: Fungi, biomes, next generation sequencing, mycobiome, microbiome

KAVAKA 48(2): 21-25(2017)

Isolation, Characterization of Endophytic Fungi of Mimusops elengi (Bakul)

Shilpa Amit Verekar , Ved Prakash ,Y. G. Chavan and S. K. Deshmukh *

Mérieux NutriSciences, Microchem House, A513, TTC Ind. Area, MIDC, Mahape, Navi Mumbai, 400701 India
Department of Biotechnology, Motilal Nehru National Institute of Technology, Allahabad, 211004, India
geneOmbio Technologies Private Limited, S No 39/3, Yogi Park, Baner, Pune 411 045, India
TERI Deakin Nano Biotechnology Centre, The Energy and Resources Institute, Darbari Seth Block, IHC Complex, Lodhi Road,
New Delhi, 110 003, India.
*Corresponding author Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
(Submitted in July, 2017; Accepted on August 2, 2017)

ABSTRACT

Fresh bark pieces of Mimusops elengi Linn. were used for the isolation of fungal endophytes using standard methods. Mimusops elengi is a small to a large evergreen medicinal plant found all over the different parts of India. Seventy one endophytic fungi belonging to ascomycetes (11.27%), coelomycetes (39.44%) and hyphomycetes (49.29%) were isolated from 200 segments of Mimusops elengi collected from Dr. H. S. Gour University campus in Sagar District, Madhya Pradesh, India. The identification of these fungi was confirmed by the BLAST search of sequences of the ITS1-5.8S-ITS2 rDNA region against the NCBI/GenBank data and compared with deposited sequences for identification purpose. Sixteen different fungal species belonging to 16 genera viz. Botryosphaeria mamane, Chaetomium globosum, Rhytidhysteron sp., Phoma putaminum, Pestaliopsis sp., Colletotricum gleosporoides, Phomopsis sp., Acremonium sp., Alternaria alternata, Beltraniella portoricensis, Cladosporium cladosporioides, Curvularia lunata, Fusarium chlamydosporum, Myrothecium verrucaria, Nigrospora oryzae and Torula herbarum were isolated. The most frequently isolated endophytes were Cladosporium cladosporioides (22.53%), Pestaliopsis sp.,(19.71%), Phomopsis sp., (9.86%) and Chaetomium globosum (8.45%). This study shows that a great number of endophytic fungi exist in the samples obtained from bark samples of M. elengi.

Key words: Fungal endophytes, bark samples, Mimusops elengi, medicinal plants.

KAVAKA 48(2):26-32(2017)

Diversity and technological potential of fungi from solar salterns of southern India

N. Thirunavukkarasu ¹ , T.S.Suryanarayanan ² *, T.Rajamani ¹ and M.B. Govinda Rajulu ²

1 PG & Research Department of Botany, Ramakrishna Mission Vivekananda College, Chennai 600004, India
2 Vivekananda Institute of Tropical Mycology (VINSTROM), Ramakrishna Mission Vidyapith, Chennai 600004, India
*Corresponding author Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
(Submitted in February, 2017; Accepted on July 30, 2017)

ABSTRACT

Twenty three species belonging to ten genera of fungi were isolated by two methods from three saltern soils of southern India. Species of Aspergillus were the most common fungi present in these samples. Three of these fungi, viz. Aspergillus sp. 3, A. terreus, and a sterile fungus (SF2) were further studied for their salt tolerance, production of some extracellular enzymes and bioactive metabolites as influenced by external salt concentration. The fungi were halotolerant and not halophilic and two of them could grow on 20% NaCl medium. Extracellular enzyme production was influenced by salt in these fungi. Some enzymes were produced through a range of salt concentration (0 to 18 %), some enzymes showed more activity in the presence of salt and a few enzymes were salt-induced. Antialgal and antifungal metabolites were elaborated only in the presence of salt.

KEY WORDS : Extremozymes, halotolerant, salt tolerant fungi

KAVAKA 48(2): 33-40(2017)

Role of Phosphate Solubilizing Fungi and Microbes for sustainable Agriculture and Agro forestry

C. Manoharachary* and D. Nagaraju
*Mycology and Molecular Plant Pathology Laboratory, Department of Botany, Osmania University, Hyderabad - 500007,
Telangana, India
Department of Botany, Govt. Degree College, Eturnagaram-506165, Distt. Warangal, Telangana, India.
Corresponding author Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
(Submitted in March, 2017; Accepted on July 10, 2017)

ABSTRACT

Phosphorus is an important nutrient required for plant growth, yield and adaptability to different ecological conditions. Many Indian soils are deficient in phosphorus. The organic form of available phosphorus is meagre and mineral phosphorus such as rock phosphate is found in large quantities. The mineral phosphorus needs to be solubilized by varied groups of microorganisms, thus making 'P' available for crop plants and forestry. This review presents information on role of phosphate solubilizing fungi and microbes for sustainable agriculture and agro-forestry.

KEYWORDS: Agriculture, agroforestry, fungi, microbes, phosphorus, rock phosphate.

KAVAKA 48(2): 41-46 (2017)

Nutritional and Neutraceutical potential of some wild edible Russulaceous mushrooms from North
West Himalayas, India

*Samidha Sharma, N. S. Atri, Munruchi Kaur and **Balwant Verma
Department of Botany, Punjabi University, Patiala.147002.
* Department of Botany, Arya College, Ludhiana, (Punjab) 141001
**Department of Biotechnology, Thapar University, Patiala, (Punjab) 147004
Corresponding author Email: samidha8885@ gmail.com
(Submitted in January, 2017 ; Accepted on June 10, 2017)

ABSTRACT

Production, characteristics and potential applications of the cellulolytic enzymes of thermophilic
moulds

Bijender Singh1 ,Anju Bala1 , Seema Dahiya1 and T. Satyanarayana2
1 Laboratory of Bioprocess Technology, Department of Microbiology, Maharishi Dayanand University, Rohtak-124001, India
2 Division of Biological Sciences and Engineering, Netaji Subhas Institute of Technology, Azad Hind Fauz Marg, Sector 3,
Dwarka, New Delhi-110078, India
*Corresponding author Email.: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
(Submitted in February, 2017;Accepted on July 10, 2017)

Lasiodiplodia hormozganensis: First report as an endophyte and a new record for India

Seasonal occurrence of marine ascomycetes and anamorphic marine fungi in mangroves of Godavari
and Krishna deltas, East coast of India

Morphological and Molecular characterization of Pleurotus flabellatus from Paechiparai forest of
Tamil Nadu, India

Insights into the Aquatic Hyphomycetes*

New additions to the genus Agaricus (Agaricaceae, Agaricales) from Northwest India

Five New Records of Family Atheliaceae from Jammu Division (J. & K.)

Book Review , Instructions