Isolation and Molecular Characterization of Keratanophilic Fungi

Soil baiting has been used for a number of years for the isolation of specific soil fungi. For isolation of keratinophilic fungi from soil, keratin or hair baiting technique given by Vanbreuseghem (1952) is widely used. As per this procedure, different keratinous substrates are used as a bait to lure keratinophilic species. In the present stuidy. soil samples from different areas of Jammu like Rajouri Spring, RS Pura, Akhnoor Jhiri area were collected and different baits like wool, feathers and hairs were used to grow keratinophilic fungi. Soil samples found positive for keratinophiles, total 43 pure cultures were isolated and out of 43, 30 cultures selected for streaking on SDA plates. Fungal isolates were identified by examining gross morphology of fungal colonies followed by microscopic visualisation. The genomic DNA of fungal isolates was isolated following the protocol of Saghai and Maroof et al with slight modification. Eukaryotic based ITS specific primers ITSI and ITS 4 were used amplify ITSI, 5.88 and ITS2 region.