Synthesis of a Lectin in Both Mycelia and Fruit Bodies of the Ascomycete Mushroom Aleuria aurantia

Abstract

  In several organisms that form fruit bodies, the synthesis of lectins is developmentally regulated. Aleuria aurantia is an ascomycete that forms a fruit body known as orange peel mushroom. To find whether the mycelia of this organism synthesize a lectin, mycelial isolates were obtained from a wild fruit body by spore germination and regeneration from a fragment of the fruit body. The isolates were identified as A. aurantia by analysis of their DNA. The mycelial isolates synthesized a lectin with the same properties as those of fruit-body lectin in terms of subunit molecular mass, immunochemical reactivity, binding specificity for L-fucose, and N-terminal amino acid sequence. Vegetatively growing mycelia synthesized as much lectin as the fruit body, so such synthesis was not developmentally regulated, unlike some other organisms that form fruit bodies.