Neorhamphoria garethjonesii
Neorhamphoria garethjonesii Boonmee, E. Hüseyin & F. Selçuk.
Index Fungorum number: 552703; Facesoffungi number: 02824
Etymology – The specific epithet ‘garethjonesii’ is name in honour of E.B. Gareth Jones in recognition of his contributions to mycology.
Holotype – MFLU16–2859
Saprobic on dead wood of Cotoneaster nummularius Fisch. & C. A. Mey., in terrestrial habitats. Sexual morph: Ascomata 179–199 µm high × 163–322 µm diam. ( x =188.5 × 257 µm, n = 3), apothecia, cup-shaped, superficial, solitary to grouped, black. Receptacle pulvinate, disc convex, disc and the margins are black. Exciple peridium 21 × 30 µm wide consisting of thick-walled, pigmented, isodiametric cells. Hymenium upper part blackish brown and lower part is hyaline. Hamathecium comprising 2 × 3 µm wide, numerous, cylindrical, broad cellular pseudoparaphyses, anastomosed, constricted septate, hyaline, apical pigmented, exceeding asci in length, apices are glued together to develop epithecium. Asci 74–110 × 21–29 µm ( x = 88 × 24.5 µm, n = 20), 8-spored, bitunicate, saccate to broad-clavate, broadly rounded at apex, non-amyloid, with a short bifurcate pedicel or apedicellate. Ascospores 20–28 × 9–13 µm (x = 25 × 11 µm, n = 20), overlapping 2–3-seriate, partially overlapping, obovoid or elliptic with broadly to narrow rounded ends, initially 1-septate at immature, becoming phrgmosporous to muriform at maturity, 3-transversely septate, with 1–2-vertical septate, hyaline, smooth-walled. Asexual morph: Undetermined as did not sporulate in culture.
Culture characteristics – Ascospores germinating on MEA within 12 h and spores changed to brown with germ tubes produced from each cell. Colonies on MEA slow growing, reaching 5 mm diam. in 2 week at 28 °C, low convex, slightly effuse hairy, fimbriate edge, aerial mycelium radiating outwards, partially superficial, and partially immersed mycelium, cream to yellowish, not sporulate on culture at 30–45 days.
Material examined – TURKEY, Kırşehir Province, Boztepe district, mountain ligth forest, on dead wood of Cotoneaster nummularius Fisch. & C. A. Mey. (Rosaceae), 1370 m, 39°13ˈ313ˈˈ N, 34°13ˈ434ˈˈ E, 2 December 2012, E. Hüseyin (KE 201, holotype; MFLU16–2859, isotype) – ex-type living culture, MFLUCC16–0210.
Notes – The black apothecial ascomata, thin inner layer of bitunicate asci and muriform ascospores found in Neorhamphoria garethjonesii are similar to these characters in some genera (e.g. Murangium and Tryblidaria) of Patellariaceae (Yacharoen et al. 2015). Neorhamphoria garethjonesii differs from these genera in having hyaline muriform ascospores with 3-transverse septa and 1–2 vertical septa. Multigene phylogenetic analysis (LSU, SSU and TEF1α) shows that N. garethjonesii formed a clade at the base of Tubeufiaceae, while the clade of Patellariaceae is distant from Neorhamphoria garethjonesii (Fig. 1). According to overall morphological characteristics, the taxon given as N. garethjonesii differs from all tubeufiaceous genera. Therefore, we introduce this new genus to accommodate a monotypic species N. garethjonesii which we treat in Dothideomycetes genera incertae sedis.
Phylogram showing the best RAxML maximum likelihood tree (lnL = -22896.365251) generated from the combined multigene (LSU, SSU and TEF1α) analysis, with the GTRGAMMAI model, for showing the placement of the new genus Neorhamphoria and other closely related members of orders of Dothideomycetes. ML bootstrap values 1,000 repetitions with ≥50 % (BS) are shown above the nodes and Bayesian posterior probabilities with ≥0.95 (PP) are marked with an asterisk (*). The tree is rooted with Dendrographa decolorans (Turner & Borrer) Ertz & Tehler (Roccellaceae, Arthoniales). The new taxon is highlighted in bold blue and all ex-type strains are in bold.
Neorhamphoria garethjonesii (MFLU16–2859, holotype). a Type material and close up of ascoma. b Cross section of ascoma. c Peridium d Pseudoparaphyses e Immature ascus f,g Asci. h-j Asci and ascospores strained in Melzer’s reagent. k, l Ascospores. Scale bars: a =500 µm, b = 200 µm, c = 50 µm, d = 5 µm, e-i = 20 µm, j-l = 10 µm