Chrysophyllum albidum Deterioration Entails Decline in Pseudomonas and Increase in Acetobacter Abundance

Abstract Microorganisms inhabiting fruits can affect the quality of fruits during storage. Some of these organisms are beneficial while others maybe deleterious (pathogenic). This paper analyzed African star apple (Chrysophyllum albidum) microbiota to detect the bacterial and fungal communities using high-throughput sequencing (HTS) technology. Healthy and diseased fruits of C. albidum were obtained from Choba market in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria. Bacterial and fungal DNA were extracted from the samples and subjected to 16S and 18S rRNA sequencing respectively. Metagenomic analyses of bacterial and fungal strains from the samples revealed total operational taxonomical units (OTUs) as 341 and 4366 respectively. Among bacteria, the phylum Proteobacteria was dominant while all identified fungi belong to the phylum Ascomycota. There was a significant reduction in the abundance of Pseudomonas in the diseased sample when compared to the healthy sample. Conversely, relative abundance of Acetobacter increased in the diseased sample compared to the healthy sample. The fungal genera, Acidomyces, Geosmithia and Magnaporthe were also obtained. Additionally, the bacterial genera, Candidatus Portiera, Blautia, Brevibacterium, Tetragenococcus and Acinetobacter which were present in healthy fruits were not present in the diseased sample. The current study has helped in recognizing the microbial community structure of healthy and diseased fruits of C. albidum. These findings can help predict microbial community structural dynamics involved in the spoilage of African star apple and thus how the spoilage can be prevented or controlled.