Characterization of cultivated strains of a new edible mushroom: Stropharia rugoso-annulata .1. Protein variability.

Fourteen cultivated strains of the edible mushroom Stropharia rugoso-annulata have been collected from different research groups in Europe and compared to evaluate intraspecific variability. Electrophoretic analysis of soluble mycelium proteins was found to be an efficient tool to describe the variability. The relative similarities between total protein patterns and esterase isozymes, as calculated from the Rogger's and Jaccard's coefficients, and the resultant dendrograms allowed us to characterize two main clusters of strains: the first one consisted of seven strains from Belgium, Germany, France and Hungary and the second included four strains from Germany and Hungary. The three remaining strains isolated following total protein analysis could be considered, with respect to esterase pattern, as close to one or the other group. The esterase enzyme study appeared as a more powerful tool to assess the intraspecific variability. This is of special interest for further work aimed at improving the commercial quality of Stropharia.