Studies on Aspergillus flavus Isolated from Keratitis Patients with a Special Reference to Aflatoxin-Producing Ability

Abstract

In the present investigation, 20 fungal strains of A. flavus and A. parasiticus that have been previously isolated from soil and keratomycosis samples has been used in this study. The clinical strains were nine and included seven strains of A. flavus in addition to two strains of A. parasiticus. The soil-borne strains were eleven including 9 strains of A. flavus and 2 strains of A. parasiticus. The main experimental results can be summarized, as follows: 1) The Mycological study showed that all fungal keratitis strains (clinical) were positive for sclerotia production (100%). However, a lower sclerotia producing ability (72.7%) were found in the soil strains (environmental). The nonproducing sclerotia strains were A. flavus AUMC 443, 4509 and 1685. It is worthy to show that in all positive producers, the scelrotia size was approximately 500 m.