- Antonio Vásquez Hidalgo*
- Professor Microbiology, School of Medicine, University of El Salvador, San Salvador, El Salvador
- DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17565141
The study focused on the identification the phenotypic and genotypic characterization of the Aspergillus genus using the Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS), which was sent to MACROGEN SOUTH KOREA Illumina NovaSeq 6000. Carried initial phase involved the collection of Caesalpinia coriaria seeds. The second phase began in 2006 with the initial macroscopic and microscopic characterization and isolation of Aspergillus. The gDNA was extracted, yielding a maximum concentration of 12.297 ng/μl (with a volume of 30 μl and a total amount of 0.369 ng), and a DNA Integrity Number (DIN) of 6.4. The maximum sample intensity was observed for 15000 bp during the Tape Station gDNA Screen quality control. qPCR analysis showed a qDNA fragment of 624 bp at a concentration of 103.24 nM (41.87 ng/μl). For the sequencing process, a total of 11,705,895,990 bp and 77,522,490 total reads were obtained using the TruSeq Nano DNA library. The nucleotide content was 49.7% GC and 50.3% AT. Quality metrics were excellent, with Q20 at 95.1% and Q30 at 88.3%, confirming high data quality. After quality and adapter trimming, and contaminant elimination, the raw data value was refined from 38,761,245 N to 30,961,740. Krona taxonomy and Heatmaps confirmed the genus as Aspergillus. In conclusion. The Aspergillus sp was successfully identified showing a variety of species, which aligns with previous studies in 2006 where it was named Aspergillus salvadorensis. The ITS and BenA sequences are not identical known species, which validates their identification as the new taxon Aspergillus salvadorensis.

