Evaluation of the damaging effect of NaCl on Phanerochaete chrysosporium with amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) analysis

An abundance of NaCl in dye wastewater is an important factor that affects the decolorization by P. chrysosporium. To investigate the influence of NaCl on the function of P. chrysosporium, its pure strain was cultured for 10 days in medium containing varying concentrations of NaCl. The cell structure and the DNA damaging were analyzed by transmission electron microscopy and AFLP, respectively. By analyzing the effect of various concentrations of NaCl on the growth and microstructure of P. chrysosporium, establishing the relationships between the DNA similarity and the NaCl concentration, and constructing the DNA UPGMA dendrograms, the damaging effect of NaCl on the structure and function of P. chrysosporium was evaluated. The results show that the influence of 3% NaCl on P. chrysosporium was minimal, with the cell structure maintained well and the rate of abnormal cells of only 14.2%. The variation rate of DNA was small that the DNA similarity was above 90% as compared to the control sample. When the concentration of NaCl was increased to 5%, cells showed relaxing contents and increased plasma vacuolation. The DNA similarity was significantly reduced to 71.4% and the rate of abnormal cells rose to 71.1%. The concentrations of NaCl between 3% and 5% thus readily damaged the structure and function of cells. When the concentration of NaCl was further increased to (8%, the cells of P. chrysosporium were deformed and plasma was completely vacuolated, indicative of a severe damage of P. chrysosporium. The DNA similarity was reduced to blow 67% and the rate of abnormal cells was increased to about 90%. The cells of P. chrysosporium thus essentially lost their original structure and function.