Microscopic fungi isolated from cave air and sediments in the Nerja Cave-preliminary results

6 p.-- Papers presented at the International Workshop "The Conservation of Subterranean Cultural Heritage", held 25-27 March 2014, in Seville, Spain.

Previous studies on the fungal community in the Nerja Cave (Malaga, Andalusia) were focused only on a capture of fungal spores from the cave atmosphere and outdoor air by the Hirst-type volumetric pollen traps, which means without cultivation methods. The results of these studies showed the presence of different spores types belongin to Oomycota, Myxomycota, but mainly to Ascomycota and Basidiomycota incluiding their anamorph states, where spores of Penicillium/Aspergillus were dominant. Our study was targeted on cultivable microscopic fungi. Several sites inside the cave, mainly in the Tourist Gallery (2011 and 2012) but also in the Upper Gallery (2012) were chosen and several soil sample were collected above the cave, the isolation from outside air was also used to compare with cave environment. Two isolation methods were used to this study – the gravity settling technique for the isolation of airborne microfungi inside and outside the cave and the silution plate method for the isolation of microfungi from cave sediment and soil above the cave. The CFU counts or airborne cultivable microfungi were found to be much lower in comparison with previous published data from volumetric traps. Nevertheless a rich microfungal spectrum was isolated from the cave air as well as from the cave sediments. To date, 16 and 6 species of the genus Aspergillus have been indentified from cave air, respectively, including one novel species.

Financiado con el Proyecto (HAR-2010-11432-E) Red de Ciencia y Tecnología para la Conservación del Patrimonio Cultural

Peer reviewed