Identification of Common Edible and Medicinal Mushrooms by DNA Barcoding

Objective: To identify common edible and medicinal mushrooms using the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region. Method: A total of eighty-five samples belonging to forty-three species were used in this study. ITS regions were amplified and sequenced. All ITS regions were analyzed using BLAST and MEGA 5.10 methods. Results: Forty species were identified correctly via BLAST method whereas forty-one species were distinguished via Neighbor joining (NJ) tree. All the species could be distinguished by BLAST combined with NJ tree and ITS sequence characteristics. Conclusion: Forty-three common species of edible and medicinal mushrooms were effectively identified using DNA barcoding technology based on ITS region.