Blastobotrys guizhouensis S. Hu, Q. Y. Zhu & F. Y. Bai, 2025

Hu, Shuang, Zhu, Qi-Yang, Zhu, Hai-Yan, Liu, Jun-Yu, Shi, Yue, Qiu, Yan-Jie, Wen, Zhang, Li, Ai-Hua, Han, Pei-Jie & Bai, Feng-Yan, 2025, Yeast diversity in traditional fermented foods of ethnic minorities in China, with the descriptions of four new yeast species, IMA Fungus 16, pp. e 146163-e 146163 : e146163-

Blastobotrys guizhouensis S. Hu, Q. Y. Zhu & F. Y. Bai sp. nov.

Etymology.

gui. zhou. en’sis. N. L. gen. masc. adj. guizhouensis of Guizhou, referring to the geographic origin of the type strain of this species.

Type.

CHINA • Guizhou Province, Qiannan Buyi and Miao Autonomous Prefecture, Anlong County, 27.0319°N, 107.5333°E, from gray jiuqu made by Buyi nationality, August 2023, Q. Y. Zhu. The holotype CGMCC 2.7784 (original number GZQ 94 Y-2) has been preserved in a metabolically inactive state in the China General Microbiological Culture Collection Center ( CGMCC), Beijing, China. An extype culture has been deposited in the Japan Collection of Microorganisms ( JCM), Koyadai, Japan, as JCM 36892 . GenBank accessions: ITS - PQ 373576 and LSU- PP 192707 . The raw genome data of CGMCC 2.7784 has been deposited in GenBank under the BioSample accession numbers SAMN 47538173 .

Culture characteristics.

After growth on YM agar for 3 days at 25 ° C, colonies are light yellow, butyrous, circular, and slightly raised, with a smooth surface and entire margins. Cells are ovoid to ellipsoidal, 2–3 × 3–5 µm. Budding is multilateral (Fig. 7 a ). After 1 month in YM broth at 25 ° C, sediment is present, but pellicle is absent. After growth on PDA agar for 2 weeks at 25 ° C, septate hyphae with a diameter of about 2.2 µm are formed. Conidiophores are formed on the hyphae and bare spherical or short-ovoid blastoconidia (Fig. 7 b ). The sexual state was not observed.

Physiological characteristics of the new species are listed in Table 2 .

Notes.

Physiologically, B. guizhouensis differs from its close relative B. persicus in the fermentation reactions of glucose and galactose; assimilation reactions of sucrose, melibiose, raffinose, melezitose, ribose, mannitol, DL-lactic acid, inositol, hexadecane, ethylamine, cadaverine, and L-lysine; and growth on 60 % glucose and at 37–42 ° C (Suppl. material 1: table S 3). A total of 35 species are currently accepted in the genus Blastobotrys ( Visagie et al. 2024) , which exist in diversified environments, including cave soil, indoor air, paintings, rotten wood, insect guts, and animal livers ( Kurtzman 2007; Middelhoven and Kurtzman 2007; Nouri et al. 2018; Chai et al. 2020; Visagie et al. 2024). Only two Blastobotrys species have been found from foods. B. meliponae was isolated from honey in Brazil ( Crous et al. 2016). B. adeninivorans was found to be a dominant species in the fermentation process of different tea products in different regions of China ( Li et al. 2018; Long et al. 2023; Wang et al. 2023). This is the first time to find a species of this genus from amylolytic starters. It is worthy of further study on the source of B. guizhouensis and its function in jiuqu.

Distribution.

China.

Figures

Figure 7. Cellular morphology of the four novel species. Blastobotrys guizhouensis sp. nov. CGMCC 2.7784 T. a Vegetative cells on YM agar at 25 ° C after 3 days; b Conidiophores and conidia on PDA agar at 25 ° C after 2 weeks. Wickerhamiella shiruii sp. nov. CGMCC 2.7449 T: c Vegetative cells and pseudohyphae on YM agar at 25 ° C after 5 days; d Containing many oil droplet cells on YCB agar at 25 ° C after 2 weeks. Trichosporon jiuqu sp. nov. CGMCC 2.8149 T: e Vegetative cells on YM agar at 25 ° C after 3 days; f True hyphae on MEA agar at 25 ° C after 2 weeks; g Blastoconidia on YCB agar at 25 ° C after 2 weeks. Parajaminaea alba sp. nov. CGMCC 2.7776 T: h Vegetative cells on YM agar at 25 ° C after 3 days. i Containing oil droplet cells on PDA agar at 25 ° C after 2 weeks. Scale bars: 10 µm.