Phenotypic and Molecular Diagnosis of four local algae from different sites of Marsh Water in Thi-Qar Province, Southern Iraq

Abstract

Diagnosing freshwater algae is important because it plays a major role in combating microorganisms such as bacteria and fungi that pose a threat to human life. The current study aimed to identify some freshwater algae in Thi-Qar Governorate, Southern Iraq, using morphology and molecular techniques. Molecular and morphological methods were used to identify four species of freshwater algae: Spirogyra neglecta, Cladophora glomerata, Chlorella vulgaris, and Spirulina sp. The NCPI website is used to register the species with GenBank. Based on the ITS-rRNA gene sequences, a phylogenetic tree was constructed using the Neighbor-Joining method and molecular evolutionary the genetics analysis with the Version 11. The branches indicate the percentage of the replicate trees in which the related taxa clustered together in the bootstrap test. As a conclusion, the present study shed lights about diversity and distribution of algal communities in local aquatic ecosystems, many freshwater algae have the potential for various bio-technological applications such as, the production from biofuels, pharmaceuticals, and high-value compounds. Accurate identification and characterization of algal strains are crucial for optimizing these applications, molecular techniques, such as DNA sequencing, can be used to investigate the evolutionary relationships and phylogenetic connections among different algal species.