@conference{
author = "Oro, Violeta and Pisinov, Boris and Tabaković, Marijenka and Sekulić, Zoran and Trkulja, Nenad",
year = "2023",
abstract = "In the past decades, great attention was devoted to extremophilic microorganisms. Extremophiles
survive in extreme conditions, such as extreme temperatures, high saline, acidic, and alkaline
solutions or environments with increased heavy metal content (1). Heavy metals are the most
persistent and complex kind of pollutants to remediate in nature. Metals, unlike most organic
compounds, do not undergo metabolic degradation and accumulate in living tissues. Among
heavy metals and metalloids, Zn, Ni, Co, and Cu are more toxic to plants, whereas As, Cd, Pb, Cr,
and Hg are more toxic to higher animals (2). They not only degrade the quality of the atmosphere,
water bodies, and food crops, but also threaten the health and well-being of animals and human
beings. Lead toxicity affects the liver, kidneys, spleen, and lungs, causing neurotoxicity,
especially in children. Cadmium ingested from food can damage the kidneys, liver and bones. Zinc is
associated with anemia and tissue pathology, and arsenic accumulates mainly in the liver, kidney,
heart, and lungs, but to a lesser extent in muscle and nerve tissue, and it is defined as a
carcinogen (3). Most contaminants are of anthropogenic origin, but some contaminants have a natural
pedo-geochemical origin. Tolypocladium parasiticum Barron, is a known entomo- and
nematode-pathogenic fungus. The fungus is an endophyte of Holcus lanatus (4) and halophilic
Salicornia europea (5). It is a member of the family Ophiocordicipitaceae, within the order
Hypocreales, the class Sordariomycetes, and the phylum Ascomycota. Tolypocladium parasiticum was
found in an abandoned medieval mine near the town of Kursumlija in the southern part of the
Republic of Serbia. The fungus was isolated from soil and maintained on PDA at 27°C. Species
identity was confirmed by molecular analyses and sequencing, using 2234C and 3126T ITS primers (6).
The GenBank accession number OR018820 was obtained for this species. Previous research on the
stress resistance investigated fungal cold activity, UV-B tolerance, and wet-heat tolerance (7).
Our study reports for the first time that the fungus survives at extremely low pH (3.1), high Zn
(204 mg/kg), Pb (74 mg/kg), Cd (0.6 mg/kg) and As (54 mg/kg) contents in soil. Our results also
revealed that Tolypocladium parasiticum is a polyextremophile, i.e., adapted to life in habitats
where various
extreme physicochemical properties occur.",
publisher = "Società Botanica Italiana Firenze (Italia)",
journal = "XIX Congress of European Mycologists Perugia, September 4th-8th, 2023",
title = "Tolypocladium parasiticum Barron, a polyextremophilic fungus",
pages = "109"
}
