Essays >> Cleistothecial Ascomycota >> Cleistothecial Ascomycota - Plate 03
Cleistothecial Ascomycota - Plate 03
1-7. Apodus deciduus Malloch & Cain
11. Ascoma (X 70). 12. Ascomatal appendage (X 1900). 13. Ascomatal initials (X 1900). 14. Cross section of the peridium (X 1900). 15. Surface of the peridium (X 1900). 16. asci (X 1900). 17. Ascospores (X 1900).
Cai et al. (Mycol. Res. 110: 359-368. 2006), carrying out a multi-gene sequence analysis of species in the genus Zopfiella, sequenced species from a number of possibly related genera, including Apodus deciduus. They defined several clades of species having little relevance to traditional concepts. Apodus deciduus fell comfortably in their well-supported "Clade C" that included Immersiella caudata, Podospora intestinacea, P. curvicolla, P. cupiformis, Tripterospora erostrata and, surprisingly, Zygopleurage zygospora. The only morphological character they could find uniting Clade C was the presence of long or short, brown, flexuous hairs on the ascomata. Wang et al. (Stud. Mycol. 93:155-252. 2019), using several genes and a slightly different set of organisms, appear to have generated a clade that is equivalent to Clade C and labeled by them only as "Lasiosphaeriaceae?". Given the diversity of generic names and morphological features in Clade C one might expect some nomencltural recombinations will be required.
The illustrations were made from TRTC 45704, isolated in culture from dung of a dusky-footed wood rat (Neotoma fuscipes) collected south of San Francisco, California.