• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.33 no.12
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• pp.1948-1956
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• 2020

Objective: The purpose of this study was to reveal the metabolic shift in the fungus cocultured with the methanogen (Methanobrevibacter thaueri). Methods: Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry was used to investigate the metabolites in anaerobic fungal (Pecoramyces sp. F1) cells and the supernatant. Results: A total of 104 and 102 metabolites were detected in the fungal cells and the supernatant, respectively. The partial least squares-discriminant analysis showed that the metabolite profiles in both the fungal cell and the supernatant were distinctly shifted when co-cultured with methanogen. Statistically, 16 and 30 metabolites were significantly (p<0.05) affected in the fungal cell and the supernatant, respectively by the co-cultured methanogen. Metabolic pathway analysis showed that co-culturing with methanogen reduced the production of lactate from pyruvate in the cytosol and increased metabolism in the hydrogenosomes of the anaerobic fungus. Citrate was accumulated in the cytosol of the fungus co-cultured with the methanogen. Conclusion: The co-culture of the anaerobic fungus and the methanogen is a good model for studying the microbial interaction between H₂-producing and H₂-utilizing microorganisms. However, metabolism in hydrogenosome needs to be further studied to gain better insight in the hydrogen transfer among microorganisms.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.303-307
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• 1996

The degree of autolysis and presence of cell-wall degrading enzymes in an anaerobic ruminal fungus, Piromyces communis OTSI, grown in liquid medium, was monitored to evaluate the effect of self-digestion on fungal biomass. After a 30 days incubation period fungal dry weight decreased by 45% and the cell wall component chitin decreased by 22%. Chitinase activity detected in the supernatant was mainly of the endotype and peaked at day 6 of the incubation. ${\beta}-1$, 3-glucanase was detected from day 4 and increased throughout the incubation period. Autolysis was a slow process, and under natural conditions it is unlikely that it plays a significant role in the degradation of the spent fungal vegetative stage in the rumen.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.12 no.5
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• pp.752-757
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• 1999

Studies were made of digestion of timothy (Pheleum pretense) hay, tall fescue (Festuca elatior) hay, and rice (Oryza sativa) straw in pure cultures of rumen anaerobic fungus, Neocallimastix frontails MCH3. The fungus was inoculated on ground forages (1%, w/v) in an anaerobic medium and incubated at $39^{\circ}C$. Incubation was continued for 24, 48, 72 and 96 h. The losses of dry matter, xylose and glucose of forage during incubation were determined at the end of these incubation periods. Xylose and glucose were considered to be released from xylan and cellulose, respectively. The digested xylan to digested cellulose (X/C) ratios of the substrate were calculated. Xylanase and carboxymethyl cellulose (CMCase) of culture supernatant and residual substrate was measured at the same time. The X/C ratios in the cultures on timothy hay and rice straw were greater than 0.5 in the first 24-h incubation period. The values were smaller than 0.3 in tall fesque. The ratio of xylanase activity to that of CMCase in the first 24-h incubation period correlated well with the traits in X/C ratio. However xylanase activity was still superior to CMCase in the following incubation period (48 to 96 h), although the glucose (designated as cellulose) was more intensively digested than xylose (designated as xylan). The production of these polysaccharidases appeared to correlate with substrate cell-wall sugar composition, xylose to glucose ratios, at the beginning of fast growing period.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.14 no.7
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• pp.941-946
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• 2001

The effects of various concentrations of saturated fatty acids (SFA; caprylic, capric and stearic acids) on the growth of the anaerobic fungus, Neocallimastix frontalis C5-1 isolated from the rumen of a Korean native goat were investigated. At higher concentrations of fatty acids (0.1%, w/v), the addition of SFA strongly decreased filter paper (FP) cellulose digestion and polysaccharide-degrading enzyme activity. The sensitivity of the rumen anaerobic fungus to the added fatty acids increased in the following order: caprylic ($C_{8:0}$)>capric($C_{10:0}$)>stearic($C_{18:0}$) acid, although stearic acid had no significant (p<0.05) inhibitory effects at any of the concentrations tested. However, the addition of SFA at lower concentrations (0.01 and 0.001% levels), did not inhibit FP cellulose degradation and enzyme activity. Furthermore, although these parameters were slightly stimulated by the addition of SFA, they were not statistically different from control values. This is the first report examining the effects of fatty acids on anaerobic gut fungi. We found that the lower levels of fatty acids used in this experiment were able to stimulate the growth and specific enzyme activities of rumen anaerobic fungi, whereas the higher levels of fatty acids were inhibitory with respect to fungal cellulolysis.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.22 no.11
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• pp.1555-1565
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• 2009

Anaerobic rumen fungi have been regarded as good genetic resources for enzyme production which might be useful for feed supplements, bio-energy production, bio-remediation and other industrial purposes. In this study, an expressed sequence tag (EST) library of the rumen anaerobic fungus Neocallimastix frontalis was constructed and functional genes from the EST library were analyzed to elucidate carbohydrate metabolism of anaerobic fungi. From 10,080 acquired clones, 9,569 clones with average size of 628 bp were selected for analysis. After the assembling process, 1,410 contigs were assembled and 1,369 sequences remained as singletons. 1,192 sequences were matched with proteins in the public data base with known function and 693 of them were matched with proteins isolated from fungi. One hundred and fifty four sequences were classified as genes related with biological process and 328 sequences were classified as genes related with cellular components. Most of the enzymes in the pathway of glucose metabolism were successfully isolated via construction of 10,080 ESTs. Four kinds of hemi-cellulase were isolated such as mannanase, xylose isomerase, xylan esterase, and xylanase. Five $\beta$-glucosidases with at least three different conserved domain structures were isolated. Ten cellulases with at least five different conserved domain structures were isolated. This is the first solid data supporting the expression of a multiple enzyme system in the fungus N. frontalis for polysaccharide hydrolysis.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.29 no.11
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• pp.1576-1584
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• 2016

Acetyl xylan esterase (AXE), which hydrolyzes the ester linkages of the naturally acetylated xylan and thus known to have an important role for hemicellulose degradation, was isolated from the anaerobic rumen fungus Neocallimastix frontatlis PMA02, heterologously expressed in Escherichi coli (E.coli) and characterized. The full-length cDNA encoding NfAXE1 was 1,494 bp, of which 978 bp constituted an open reading frame. The estimated molecular weight of NfAXE1 was 36.5 kDa with 326 amino acid residues, and the calculated isoelectric point was 4.54. The secondary protein structure was predicted to consist of nine ${\alpha}$-helixes and 12 ${\beta}$-strands. The enzyme expressed in E.coli had the highest activity at $40^{\circ}C$ and pH 8. The purified recombinant NfAXE1 had a specific activity of 100.1 U/mg when p-nitrophenyl acetate (p-NA) was used as a substrate at $40^{\circ}C$, optimum temperature. The amount of liberated acetic acids were the highest and the lowest when p-NA and acetylated birchwood xylan were used as substrates, respectively. The amount of xylose released from acetylated birchwod xylan was increased by 1.4 fold when NfAXE1 was mixed with xylanase in a reaction cocktail, implying a synergistic effect of NfAXE1 with xylanase on hemicellulose degradation.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.26 no.10
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• pp.1416-1423
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• 2013

The metabolomic profile of the anaerobic fungus Piromyces sp. F1, isolated from the rumen of goats, and how this is affected by the presence of naturally associated methanogens, was analyzed by nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. The major metabolites in the fungal monoculture were formate, lactate, ethanol, acetate, succinate, sugars/amino acids and ${\alpha}$-ketoglutarate, whereas the co-cultures of anaerobic fungi and associated methanogens produced citrate. This is the first report of citrate as a major metabolite of anaerobic fungi. Univariate analysis showed that the mean values of formate, lactate, ethanol, citrate, succinate and acetate in co-cultures were significantly higher than those in the fungal monoculture, while the mean values of glucose and ${\alpha}$-ketoglutarate were significantly reduced in co-cultures. Unsupervised principal components analysis revealed separation of metabolite profiles of the fungal mono-culture and co-cultures. In conclusion, the novel finding of citrate as one of the major metabolites of anaerobic fungi associated with methanogens may suggest a new yet to be identified pathway exists in co-culture. Anaerobic fungal metabolism was shifted by associated methanogens, indicating that anaerobic fungi are important providers of substrates for methanogens in the rumen and thus play a key role in ruminal methanogenesis.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.14 no.8
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• pp.1110-1117
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• 2001

Responses of the rumen fungus, Neocallimastix frontalis RE1, to long chain fatty acid (LCFA) were evaluated by measuring gas production, filter paper (FP) cellulose digestion and polysaccharidase enzyme activities. LCFA (stearic acid, $C_{18:0}$; oleic acid, $C_{18:1}$; linoleic acid, $C_{18:2}$ and linolenic acid, $C_{18:3}$) were emulsitied by ultrasonication under anaerobic condition, and added to the medium. When N frontalis RE1 was grown in culture with stearic, oleic and linoleic acid, the cumulative gas production, gas pool size, FP cellulose digestion and enzymes activities significantly (p<0.05) increased at some incubation times(especially, exponential phases of fungal growth, 48~120 h of incubation) relative to that for control cultures. However, the addition of linolenic acid strongly inhibited all of the investigated parameters up to 120 h incubation, but not after 168 and 216 h of incubation. These results indicated that stearic, oleic and linoleic acids tended to have great stimulatory effects on fungal cellulolysis, whereas linolenic acid caused a significant (p<0.05) inhibitory effects on the cellulolysis by the rumen fungus. These results are the first report of the effect of LCFAs on the ruminal fungi. Further research is needed to identify the mode of action of LCFAs on fungal strains and to verify whether or not ruminal fungi have ability to hydrate unsaturated LCFAs to saturated FAs. There was high correlation between cumulative in vitro gas production and fungal growth (94.78%), FP cellulose degradation (96.34%), CMCase activity(90.86%) or xylanase activity (87.67%). Thus measuring of cumulative gas production could be a useful tool for evaluating fungal growth and/or enzyme production by ruminal fungi.

• Asian-Australasian Journal of Animal Sciences
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.23-30
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• 2000

The effects of grass lipids and long chain fatty acids (LCFA; palmitic, stearic and oleic acids), at low concentrations (0.001~0.02%), on the growth and enzyme activity of two strains of anaerobic fungi, monocentric strain Piromyces rhizinflata B157 and polycentric strain Orpinomyces joyonii SG4, were investigated. The addition of grass lipids to the medium significantly (p<0.05) decreased filter paper (FP) cellulose digestion, cellulase activity and fungal growth compared to control treatment. However, LCFA did not have any significant inhibitory effects on fungal growth and enzyme activity, which, however, were significantly (p<0.05) stimulated by the addition of oleic acid as have been observed in rumen bacteria and protozoa. This is the first report to our knowledge on the effects of LCFA on the rumen anaerobic fungi. Continued work is needed to identify the mode of action of LCFA in different fungal strains and to verify whether these microorganisms have ability to hydrogenate unsaturated fatty acids to saturated fatty acids.

• Korean Journal of Veterinary Research
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• v.33 no.1
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• pp.53-60
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• 1993

Anaerobic bacteria are suggested to be potential source for new antibiotics. In order to search for antibiotics from domestic origin, we collected 800 soil samples across Korean locations and could isolate as many as 989 anaerobic strains. Among them 10, strains were found to have good producing capacity of antibiotics. An anaerobe was finally selected due to secreting antibiotics having high antimicrobial activity towards multiple resistant microorganism(E coli JM 83) transformed by genetic engineering technique. Its morphological, physiological and biochemical charateristics were investigated, together with antimicrobial spectrum therefrom. On antimicrobial spectrum study, substance secreted from this strain, had no activities to fungus and yeast. The selected strain showed G(+) and coccal shape, on Gram, staining and electron scanning microscopy, respectively. Biochemically this strain utilized glucose, fructose lactose, sucrose, but did not arabinose, cellulose, rhamnose, sorbitol, trehalose, mannitol. Catalase test showed negative property. Optimal growth temperature was $37^{\circ}C$. The results obtained above suggest this strain Streptococcus faecium subspp. and we named it Streptococcus sp. An-21-1.