Variations in aerial mycobiota of archeological sites of taxila, Pakistan
Paper Details
Variations in aerial mycobiota of archeological sites of taxila, Pakistan
Abstract
The transportation of air borne fungal spores to the surface of archeological monuments is very significant step in the process of biodeterioration. The present study was designed to isolate the aerial mycobiota from six world heritage sites of Taxila. The fungal spores were trapped by petri plate gravitational method and three culture media malt extract agar, potato dextrose agar and czapek dox agar were used. A total of 30 fungal species belonging to 19 different genera were recorded through out the year. The quantitative analysis of data revealed that Alternaria alternata with 9.79% of total colonies was the dominant species in the air of selected sites followed by Aspergillus niger (9.10%), Cladosporium herbarum (8.02%), Penicillium chrysogenum (7.53%), Fusarium oxysporum (6.94%), Aspergillus flavus (6.73%), Aspergillus fumigatus (6.0%), Penicillium frequentans (4.68%), Cladosporium cladosporioides (3.85%), Alternaria solani (3.78%), Mucor mucedo (3.50%) and Helminthosporium solani (3.40%). The qualitative analysis of isolated fungal species clearly indicated a well marked variation in the composition of aerial mycobiota of selected sites as some fungal species were restricted to particular archaeological sites. The present investigation is first study of aerial mycobiota of world fame archaeological sites of Taxila.
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