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Complex microbial communities inhabiting natural Cordyceps militaris and the habitat soil and their predicted functions

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Abstract

Cordyceps militaris is a traditional Chinese medicinal food that is challenging to quality maintaining while mass cultivation. Many studies have found that abundant microbes inhabit Ophiocordyceps sinensis and perform important functions for their host. In this study, our objective was to reveal the microbial communities that inhabit C. militaris and analyze their potential functions. High-throughput sequencing of 16S rRNA and ITS genes was used to compare the diversity and composition of the bacterial and fungal communities associated with naturally occurring C. militaris collected from Yunnan Province, southwestern China. The diversity and richness of the microbial communities and the number of function genes of the bacteria were significantly higher in the habitat soil than in the fruiting body. The sclerotia and stromata samples shared the same microbiota and functions. The main bacterial phyla were Proteobacteria, Acidobacteria, Bacteroidetes and Actinobacteria, and Ascomycota was the main fungal phylum. The growth-promoting bacteria Herbaspirillum and the plant probiotic Phyllobacterium, which may enhance C. militaris quality and facilitate its cultivation, were detected in the fruiting body samples. Genes related to metabolism were more abundant in the soil bacteria, while membrane transport genes were more abundant in the endophytic bacteria of C. militaris. Our study is the first to reveal the unexpectedly high diversity of the microbial communities and the bacterial functions inhabiting the natural C. militaris using high-throughput sequencing, and our results provide insights into mining the functions of microorganisms in the development and quality of C. militaris.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos.: 31960001, 31870017, 21662048), the joint fund key project of Yunnan science and technology department—Yunnan University (No. 2018FY006), the Top Young Talents of Ten Thousand Program in Yunnan province. Expenditures of field studies and sample collections are funded by project No. 31960001; all expenditures of high throughput sequencing are funded by project No. 2018FY006; expenditures of student service fees are funded by project No. 31870017.

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  1. Xiao-Mei Zhang and De-Xiang Tang have contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Yunnan Herbal Laboratory, Ecology and Environmental Sciences, Yunnan University, No. 2 Cuihu Lake North Road, Kunming, 650091, Yunnan, China

    Xiao-Mei Zhang, De-Xiang Tang, Yuan-Bing Wang, Zhi-Hong Xu & Hong Yu

  2. College of Basic Medicine, Yunnan University of Chinese Medicine, Kunming, 650500, Yunnan, China

    Xiao-Mei Zhang

  3. The Research Center of Cordyceps Development and Utilization of Kunming, Yunnan Herbal Biotech Co. Ltd., Kunming, 650106, China

    Xiao-Mei Zhang, De-Xiang Tang, Yuan-Bing Wang, Zhi-Hong Xu & Hong Yu

  4. The International Joint Research Center for Sustainable Utilization of Cordyceps Bioresources in China and Southeast Asia, Yunnan University, Kunming, 650091, China

    De-Xiang Tang, Yuan-Bing Wang, Zhi-Hong Xu & Hong Yu

  5. Kunming Xianghao Technology Co., Ltd., Kunming, 650204, China

    Qing-Qing Li

  6. State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol and Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Plant Resources, School of Life Sciences, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, 510275, China

    Wen-Jun Li

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  1. Xiao-Mei Zhang
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Contributions

HY conceived and designed the experiments; XZ, YW, QL, ZX and DT collected the samples; DT, YW and ZX performed the experiments; XZ analyzed the data and wrote the manuscript; HY and WL revised the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Wen-Jun Li or Hong Yu.

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Zhang, XM., Tang, DX., Li, QQ. et al. Complex microbial communities inhabiting natural Cordyceps militaris and the habitat soil and their predicted functions. Antonie van Leeuwenhoek 114, 465–477 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10482-021-01534-6

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