An Electrophoretic Study of Enzymes as a Tool in the Taxonomy of the Dermatophytes

Zymogram patterns from 84 strains of dermatophyte fungi were obtained using polyacrylamide gradient gel electrophoresis of total cell protein extracts. The enzymes investigated were alpha-naphthyl acetate esterase, acid phosphatase, lactate dehydrogenase, malate dehydrogenase, tetrazolium oxidase and catalase. These patterns were used to construct similarity matrices and dendrograms using computerized techniques. The results showed that zymograms allowed some species to be readily recognized despite morphological variation. This was also seen in the dendrograms where, in addition, groupings based on ecological or sexual criteria could be distinguished.