Morphology, phylogeny and cultural characteristics of Aspergillus rosettanus, a novel species in section Circumdati isolated from Wadi-El-Natron, Egypt

Aspergillus species can colonize a wide range of substrates, and they are frequently found in a wide range of situations. More than 340 species make up the genus Aspergillus (family Aspergillaceae); some of these species are toxic to humans, animals, or plants and produce aflatoxins and ochratoxins. This research discovered a novel Aspergillus strain from the Aspergillus: section Circumdati in a soil sample taken from a region near Rosetta Lake at Wadi-El-Natron region, Egypt. It was originally identified as A. insulicola and deposited with the entry number MF075156 into the NCBI nucleotide database. Based on molecular analyses of the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region and comparisons between the strain's macroscopic and microscopic characteristics with those of other species in section Circumdati, the strain was suggested as a novel species in the current research and given the name Aspergillus rosettanus. This novel species can be distinguished from the existing Aspergillus species in section Circumdati by having smaller conidial heads (45-65 µm), metulae (4-6 µm), and phialides (5-7 µm).