We evaluated the fungal diversity in two lakes on the South Shetland Islands, using DNA metabarcoding through high-throughput sequencing (HTS). A microcosm experiment was deployed for two consecutive years in lakes on Deception and King George islands to capture potential decomposer freshwater fungi. Analyses of the baits revealed 258,326 DNA reads distributed in 34 fungal taxa of the phyla Ascomycota, Basidiomycota, Mortierellomycota, Chytridiomycota and Rozellomycota. Tetracladium marchalianum, Tetracladium sp., Rozellomycota sp., Fungal sp. 1 and Fungal sp. 2 were the most common taxa detected. However, the majority of the communities comprised intermediate and rare taxa. Both fungal communities displayed moderate indices of diversity, richness and dominance. Only six taxa were detected in both lakes, including the most dominant T. marchalianum and Tetracladium sp. The high numbers of reads of the known aquatic saprotrophic hyphomycetes T. marchalianum and Tetracladium sp. in the baits suggest that these fungi may digest organic material in Antarctic lakes, releasing available carbon and nutrients to the other aquatic organisms present in the complex lake food web. Our data confirm that the use of cotton baits together with HTS approaches can be appropriate to study the diversity of resident freshwater fungi present in Antarctic lakes.

我们通过高通量测序（HTS）使用DNA metabarcoding对南设得兰群岛的两个湖泊中的真菌多样性进行了评估。连续两年在缩影湖和乔治国王岛的湖泊中进行了缩影实验，以捕获潜在的分解者淡水真菌。对诱饵的分析显示，258,326个DNA读物分布在34个真菌类群的子囊子，担子菌，Mortierellomycota，Chytridiomycota和Rozellomycota中。玛氏四角菌（Tetracladium marchalianum），四角菌属（Rotraellomycota）sp。，真菌sp。1和真菌sp。2个是最常见的分类单元。但是，大多数社区包括中级和稀有分类群。两个真菌群落均显示出适度的多样性，丰富度和优势度指数。在这两个湖中仅检测到六个分类单元，包括最主要的马氏丁香球菌和四环菌。大量已知的水生腐生菌丝菌T. marchalianum和Tetracladium的读数很高sp。诱饵中的细菌表明这些真菌可能会消化南极湖泊中的有机物质，并向复杂的湖泊食物网中存在的其他水生生物释放可用的碳和养分。我们的数据证实，棉饵与高温超导方法一起使用可能适合研究南极湖泊中存在的常驻淡水真菌的多样性。