Do mangrove habitats serve as a reservoir for Medicopsis romeroi, a clinically important fungus

Abstract

Medicopsis romeroi is one of the frequent pathogens causing subcutaneous infections in immunocompromised patients. In this study, a sexual morph of Medicopsis romeroi was found on a decaying woody stem of the mangrove plant Suaeda monoica and its asexual morph was produced on malt extract agar. The sexual morph connection was established based on both morphological data and multigene phylogenetic analyses. Neomedicopsis chiangmaiensis comb. nov. is proposed by transferring Medicopsis chiangmaiensis to the genus Neomedicopsis based on morphology and multigene phylogenetic analyses. The preliminary pathogenicity tests on Medicopsis romeroi strain demonstrated beta haemolysin and esterase activities, and its ability to grow at 37 °C. It also exhibited strong activity in in vitro tests for aspartyl proteases, extracellular phospholipase, lipase and chitinase and mild activity for amylase and urease suggesting that this strain of Medicopsis romeroi, isolated from a mangrove habitat, could be an opportunistic pathogen to immunocompromised patients.