Kõljalg Urmas, Larsson Karl-Henrik, Abarenkov Kessy, Nilsson R Henrik, Alexander Ian J, Eberhardt Ursula, Erland Susanne, Høiland Klaus, Kjøller Rasmus, Larsson Ellen, Pennanen Taina, Sen Robin, Taylor Andy F S, Tedersoo Leho, Vrålstad Trude, Ursing Björn M
Institute of Botany, University of Tartu, 40 Lai Str., EE-51005 Tartu, Estonia.
New Phytol. 2005 Jun;166(3):1063-8. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8137.2005.01376.x.
Identification of ectomycorrhizal (ECM) fungi is often achieved through comparisons of ribosomal DNA internal transcribed spacer (ITS) sequences with accessioned sequences deposited in public databases. A major problem encountered is that annotation of the sequences in these databases is not always complete or trustworthy. In order to overcome this deficiency, we report on UNITE, an open-access database. UNITE comprises well annotated fungal ITS sequences from well defined herbarium specimens that include full herbarium reference identification data, collector/source and ecological data. At present UNITE contains 758 ITS sequences from 455 species and 67 genera of ECM fungi. UNITE can be searched by taxon name, via sequence similarity using blastn, and via phylogenetic sequence identification using galaxie. Following implementation, galaxie performs a phylogenetic analysis of the query sequence after alignment either to pre-existing generic alignments, or to matches retrieved from a blast search on the UNITE data. It should be noted that the current version of UNITE is dedicated to the reliable identification of ECM fungi. The UNITE database is accessible through the URL http://unite.zbi.ee
外生菌根（ECM）真菌的鉴定通常是通过将核糖体DNA内转录间隔区（ITS）序列与公共数据库中已收录的序列进行比较来实现的。遇到的一个主要问题是，这些数据库中的序列注释并不总是完整或可靠的。为了克服这一缺陷，我们报告了一个开放获取的数据库——UNITE。UNITE包含来自明确的标本馆标本的注释良好的真菌ITS序列，这些标本包括完整的标本馆参考鉴定数据、采集者/来源和生态数据。目前，UNITE包含来自455种、67属ECM真菌的758个ITS序列。可以通过分类名称、使用blastn通过序列相似性以及使用galaxie通过系统发育序列鉴定来搜索UNITE。在实施后，galaxie会在将查询序列与预先存在的通用比对或从对UNITE数据的blast搜索中检索到的匹配项进行比对后，对查询序列进行系统发育分析。需要注意的是，UNITE的当前版本致力于外生菌根真菌的可靠鉴定。可通过网址http://unite.zbi.ee访问UNITE数据库。
