Can arthropods act as vectors of fungal dispersion in heritage collections? A case study on the archive of the University of Coimbra, Portugal

Abstract A previous work that used documents from the Archive of the University of Coimbra, described a high fungal diversity colonizing different types of documents. Cladosporium, Aspergillus and Penicillium were the most common genera found in documents where biodegradation was more evident. The presence of arthropods circulating through the Archive suggested that zoochoric dispersion could play a significant role in the dispersion of fungal species between documents in similar environments. The aims of this study were to evaluate the role of arthropods as fungal dispersers and potential vectors of contamination between the documents from the Archive of the University of Coimbra; to study the effects of seasonality in the diversity of fungal species associated with invertebrates; and to understand the relationship between the identified fungal species and the different arthropod taxa. The sequencing of the total ITS region combined with the analysis of macroscopic and microscopic taxonomic traits, provided data on the fungal diversity carried by arthropods. Results show a high fungal diversity associated with invertebrates: from a total of over 148 isolates, 25 fungal genera and 59 species were identified and kept in culture. The most common genera were Penicillium, Aspergillus and Cladosporium.