Characterization of chlordecone-tolerant fungal populations isolated from long-term polluted tropical volcanic soil in the French West Indies
2014
Merlin, Chloé | Devers, Marion | Crouzet, Olivier | Heraud, Cécile | Steinberg, Christian | Mougin, Christian | Martin-Laurent, Fabrice
The insecticide chlordecone is a contaminant found in most of the banana plantations in the French West Indies. This study aims to search for fungal populations able to grow on it. An Andosol heavily contaminated with chlordecone, perfused for 1 year in a soil–charcoal system, was used to conduct enrichment cultures. A total of 103 fungal strains able to grow on chlordecone-mineral salt medium were isolated, purified, and deposited in the MIAE collection (Microorganismes d'Intérêt Agro-Environnemental, UMR Agroécologie, Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique, Dijon, France). Internal transcribed spacer sequencing revealed that all isolated strains belonged to the Ascomycota phylum and gathered in 11 genera: Metacordyceps, Cordyceps, Pochonia, Acremonium, Fusarium, Paecilomyces, Ophiocordyceps, Purpureocillium, Bionectria, Penicillium, and Aspergillus. Among predominant species, only one isolate, Fusarium oxysporum MIAE01197, was able to grow in a liquid culture medium that contained chlordecone as sole carbon source. Chlordecone increased F. oxysporum MIAE01197 growth rate, attesting for its tolerance to this organochlorine. Moreover, F. oxysporum MIAE01197 exhibited a higher EC₅₀value than the reference strain F. oxysporum MIAE00047. This further suggests its adaptation to chlordecone tolerance up to 29.2 mg l⁻¹. Gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis revealed that 40 % of chlordecone was dissipated in F. oxysporum MIAE01197 suspension culture. No chlordecone metabolite was detected by GC-MS. However, weak amount of¹⁴CO₂evolved from¹⁴C₁₀-chlordecone and¹⁴C₁₀-metabolites were observed. Sorption of¹⁴C₁₀-chlordecone onto fungal biomass followed a linear relationship (r² = 0.99) suggesting that it may also account for chlordecone dissipation in F. oxysporum MIAE01197 culture.
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