ABSTRACT
@#Abstract: Objective To screen out a more universally applicable culture medium for the isolation and culturing of pathogenic fungi through comparing the performance of various universal fungal culture media, to optimize the fungal culturomics technique, and to better apply it to the culturomics research of pathogenic fungi. Methods Multiple common fungal culture media Sabouraud dextrose agar (SDA), potato dextrose agar (PDA), modified Dixon (mDixon), modified LeemingNotman agar (MLNA), etc., and a new pan-fungal medium (PF) were used to culture 40 strains of common pathogenic fungi to determine the growth states of strains under different conditions. Based on that, PF, SDA, PDA, mDixon and MLNA, a total of 5 culture media, were used to isolate and culture a simulated sample (suspension of Candida albicans and Aspergillus fumigatus), 10 human samples (4 fecal samples and 6 vaginal secretion samples) and 3 environmental samples. Results The positive growth rates of 40 strains of pathogenic fungi in the 7 media were as follows: PDA 95.0% (38/40), SDA 95.0% (38/40), BHI 95.0% (38/40), YPD 90.0% (36/40), mDixon 95.0% (38/40), MLNA 87.5% (35/40), PF 100.0% (40/40). For the simulated samples, PF could effectively promote the self-limited growth of filamentous fungi, performing better in isolation and culture. For the human samples and environmental samples, PF showed the same versatility as SDA and PDA. Conclusions In the isolation and culturing of pathogenic fungi, PF medium can effectively isolate and culture most fungal species. Meanwhile, PF can make the fast-growing fungi show self-limited growth and clear edges, and not easy to cross-contamination, which indicates it is conducive to the isolation and identification of single colonies. PF medium outperforms other common media in isolating strains from unknown samples in culturomics, which illustrates PF medium can be effectively used for the study of fungal culturomics.