2012). With the invention

of next-generation sequencing (NGS), fungus-specific barcoding primers can be used with metagenomics, a huge-scale nucleotide-sequence-based tool, to analyze microbial communities regardless of an organism’s culturability (Cowan et al. 2005). The tool provides high throughput sequencing of PCR amplicons from a single DNA extraction and estimates of the relative abundance of the organisms detected (Hirsch et al. 2010). However, because a single barcode is limited in representing the panorama of a microbial community, combinations of multiple barcodes have thus been recommended (DeSalle et al. 2008). Based on the evaluation of Schoch et al. (2012), we selected four nuclear ribosomal markers, two nrITS regions (ITS1/2 and ITS3/4) and two in the nrLSU region (nrLSU-LR and nrLSU-U) (Vilgalys and Hester 1990; Wu et al. 2002). The Ferrostatin-1 molecular weight large subunit of the mitochondria ribosomal region (mtLSU) and the sixth subunit of mitochondrial ATPase (mtATP6) (Zeng et al. 2004; Grubisha et al. 2012) have also been adopted as markers. In this study, we deciphered the microbiome of cultivated orchid roots based on amplicon-based metagenomics. Using multiple barcodes, we investigated the taxon diversity of the fungal community and examined the consistency among barcodes in uncovering the composition of the fungal flora and the ecological interactions between fungal endophytes and orchids. We also compared traditional

Sanger sequencing of full-length nrITS with NGS techniques. A rank-scoring strategy was

also developed to integrate the information selleck products on species composition across barcodes. Materials and methods Plant materials and DNA extraction Phalaenopsis KC1111 (Phalaenopsis Taisuco Snow × Doritaenopsis White Wonder) was obtained from the Taiwan Sugar Corporation (Taisuco) and grown in the greenhouse of National Cheng Kung University in Tainan, Taiwan. Plants were watered once a week without any pesticide or fertilizer. Microbial contamination from the potting media was eliminated by sterilizing the roots from five individuals of Phalaenopsis KC1111 in 2 % NaOCl for 15 min with five subsequent washes with water (Zelmer et al. 1996). These tissues were ground into powder with liquid nitrogen. Total genomic DNAs were extracted by using a modified cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) method (Doyle and Doyle Sclareol 1987). Gene cloning and Sanger sequencing Full-length nrITS genomic DNA region, a marker often used for identifying fungi (Nilsson et al. 2008), was PCR amplified using the ITS1/ITS4 primer pairs (Wu et al. 2002) in a 50 μL reaction mixture containing 25 μL Taq DNA Polymerase 2× Master Mix Red (Ampliqon, Denmark), 5 μL forward and reverse primers (ITS1 and ITS4, 2 ng/μL, Table S1) each, and 5 μL genomic DNA (2 ng/μL). The PCR cycling scheme consisted of one cycle of 94 °C/3 min; 35 cycles of 94 °C/30 s, 55 °C/37s, 72 °C/30 s; and a final extension at 72 °C/10 min.