The genus Penicillium (phylum Ascomycota) includes many species of industrial and ecological importance.Among them, P. roqueforti is widely used as a starter culture in blue cheese, partly due to its high -glutamyltransferase (GGT) activity, which contributes to flavor enhancement (GGP production) and umami taste.Though P. roqueforti is frequently associated with cheese environments, it has also been detected in diverse habitats, including fermented foods such as meju, a Korean traditional soybean brick.Despite its occurrence in meju, genomes from such non-dairy isolates remain poorly characterized.We present the complete genome sequences of four P. roqueforti strains derived from meju, and compare their genomic features and secondary metabolite gene profiles.Penicillium roqueforti is a filamentous fungus used in blue cheese production but also occurs in meju, a Korean fermented soybean brick.The four meju-derived P. roqueforti genomes ranged from 27.03 to 28.89 Mb, with GC contents of 48.1-48.2% and 9,860-10,487 predicted coding sequences (CDSs).AntiSMASH analysis identified biosynthetic clusters for roquefortine, patulin, and mycophenolic acid in three strains, whereas MJ1410 uniquely harbored the PR-toxin cluster but lacked mycophenolic acid genes, resembling the cheese strain P. roqueforti FM164.These genomic data provide insights into the diversity and secondary metabolite potential of P. roqueforti from non-dairy fermentations.
Lee et al. (Tue,) studied this question.