PCR based fingerprinting of Westiellopsis cultures with short tandemly repeated repetitive (STRR) and highly iterated palindrome (HIP) sequences

The presence of repetitive DNA sequences viz., short tandemly repeated repetitive (STRR) and highly iterated palindrome (HIP), in the cyanobacterial genome were used to generate a PCR-based fingerprint pattern of nine cyanobacterial cultures (both stress tolerant and non-tolerant), belonging to the genus Westiellopsis. By this method it was possible to generate distinguishing fingerprint patterns for all the isolates and cluster isolates with similar stress tolerance properties. This study reveals the utility of repetitive DNA sequences in the cyanobacterial genome, for differentiation of Westiellopsis cultures and clustering strains that posses similar stress tolerance properties.