| β-tubulin (benA, tub-2) and calmodulin (caM) are crucial genes in the taxonomy of Aspergillus section Nigri. Widely used β-tubulin primers are not specific for the benA gene for some taxa and preferentially amplify the tubC paralogue. Sequences of the tubC paralogue are widely combined with benA sequences in recent taxonomical works as well as other works, resulting in incongruent trees. In this study we newly provide benA sequences for several ex-type strains, which were characterised using the tubC gene only. We designed a highly specific forward primer to benA designated Ben2f for use in Aspergillus section Nigri, and tested specificity of numerous primer combinations to β-tubulin paralogs. The primer pairs with the highest specificity to the benA gene... |
