Electrophoretic karyotypes of some related Mucor species

Contour clamped homogeneous electric field (CHEF) gel electrophoresis was u sed to obtain electrophoretic karyotypes from nine Mucor strains representi ng five different species (M. bainieri, M. circinelloides, M. mucedo, M. pl umbeus and M. racemosus). The chromosomal banding patterns revealed high va riability among the isolates. The sizes of the DNA in the Mucor chromosomes were estimated to be between 2.5 and 8.7 Mb. The total genome sizes were c alculated to be between 30.0 and 44.7 Mb. The applicability of these electr ophoretic karyotypes for the investigation of genome structure, for strain identification and for species delimitation is considered.