Journal of Environmental Biology

Diversity analysis of geographically isolated strains of

Spirulina and related genera

Nirbhay Kumar Singh* and Dolly Wattal Dhar

Centre for Conservation and Utilisation of Blue Green Algae (CCUBGA), Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), New Delhi-110 012, India

*Corresponding Author E-mail: nirbhaysingh78@gmail.com

Publication Data

Paper received:

21 July 2012

Revised received:

10 April 2013

Accepted:

03 June 2013

Abstract

The strains of Spirulina and related cyanobacteria were studied for their morphological, biochemical, and molecular diversity. The microscopic study showed presence of regular or irregular spiral in the trichomes of Spirulina and Arthrospira whereas; Lyngbya, Oscillatoria and Phormidium strains showed straight, flexuous, and densely entangled trichomes, respectively. Total soluble proteins content differed widely among the strains. The Spirulina and Arthrospira showed significantly higher protein content than other strains. Twenty 10 mer random primers and ten multiplex Randomly Amplified Polymorphic DNA (RAPD)-PCR reactions revealed 9-28 polymorphic DNA bands ranging from 220bp-3800bp with single oligos and 13-32 polymorphic bands ranging from 150bp-5000bp with multiplex reactions. Combined analysis of all reactions RAPD reactions showed a maximum similarity coefficient of about 0.90 amongst the two strains of Arthrospira (Ar-1 and Ar-2); which also possessed very close proteins content (110.30?gml^-1 and 119.49 ?gml-1, respectively). Random primers OPD-02, OPA11 and OPD-16 produced six, five, and five unique bands; whereas, the multiplexing of primers OPD-02+HipGC and OPA10+ HipTG produced seven and six unique bands, respectively. The study undertaken revealed extensive evidence for the applicability of such morphological, biochemical, and molecular diversity in the diversity analysis of Spirulina and related genera.

 Key words

Cyanobacteria, Diversity analysis, Multiplex, Phylogeny, RAPD, Spirulina 

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