The psychrotolerant yeast Mrakia frigida has been isolated from sea sediment in Antarctica, and can produce a toxin active against other yeasts such as Metschnikowia bicuspidata (Hua et al. 2010).
Mrakia frigida is a member of the Cystofilobasidiaceae family from the order Cystofilobasidiales, and was sequenced as part of the 1000 Fungal Genomes Project. The 1000 Fungal Genomes Project aims fill in gaps in the Fungal Tree of Life by sequencing at least two reference genomes from the more than 500 recognized families of Fungi. This project additionally aims to inform research on plant-microbe interactions, microbial emission and capture of greenhouse gasses, and environmental metagenomic sequencing.
Images courtesy of Zhen-Ming Chi
Genome Reference(s)
Mondo SJ, He G, Sharma A, Ciobanu D, Riley R, Andreopoulos WB, Lipzen A, Kuo A, LaButti K, Pangilinan J, Salamov A, Salamon H, Shu L, Gladden J, Magnuson J, Aime MC, O'Malley R, Grigoriev IV
Consecutive low-frequency shifts in A/T content denote nucleosome positions across microeukaryotes.
iScience. 2025 May 16;28(5):112472. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2025.112472
Reference
Hua MX, Chi Z, Liu GL, Buzdar MA, Chi ZM. Production of a novel and cold-active killer toxin by Mrakia frigida 2E00797 isolated from sea sediment in Antarctica. Extremophiles. 2010; 14(6):515-21
