High tolerance and degradation of fungicides by fungal strains isolated from contaminated soils

ABSTRACT

The aim of this work was to isolate fungal strains from phytotoxic agricultural soils, screen them, categorize the most tolerant fungi to three fungicides, and identify them by a molecular approach. In this study, 28 fungal strains were isolated from phytotoxic agricultural soil with intensive use of pesticides. The capacity of fungi to resist and degrade different concentrations of carbendazim, captan, and zineb was determined by an exploratory multivariate analysis. Actinomucor elegans LBM 239 was identified as the most tolerant fungus to these fungicides, degrading a 86.62% of carbendazim after 7 days of treatment. In conclusion, A. elegans LBM 239 demonstrated the highest tolerance and capacity to biodegrade carbendazim, becoming a potential candidate for bioremediation of contaminated soils with carbendazim, captan, or zineb.

KEYWORDS:

• Actinomucor elegans
• biodegradation
• mycoremediation
• phytotoxic soil

SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL

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DISCLOSURE STATEMENT

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was partially funded by Secretaría de Políticas Universitarias through project VT38 UNAM 9026 and by Secretaría de Ciencia y Tecnología de la Universidad Nacional de Misiones through project 16Q006TI. P.D.Z. and M.A.S. are researchers for the National Research Council of Argentina (CONICET). A.J.B. has a fellowship from Consejo Interuniversitario Nacional (CIN); G.V.D. has a postdoctoral fellowship from CONICET; Ingrid Judith Belén Szylak has a fellowship from Secretaría General de Ciencia y Tecnología de la Universidad Nacional de Misiones; and A.A.B. has a fellowship from Consejo Interuniversitario Nacional (CIN).