Ellisembia

Fungalpedia – Note 2825, Ellisembia

Citation when using this data: Wenping Wu et al. 2022 – Fungalpedia.

Index Fungorum, Facesoffungi, MycoBank, GenBank

Classification: Incertae sedis, Incertae sedis, Incertae sedis, Sordariomycetes, Pezizomycotina, Ascomycota, Fungi

= Imicles Shoemaker & Hambleton, Can. J. Bot. 79: 598, 2001.

= Lecythothecium Réblová, Mycologia 93: 481, 2001.

= Pyrigemmula D. Magyar & R. Shoemaker, Mycol. Prog. 10:309, 2011.

Colonies effuse, brown, hairy, often inconspicuous. Teleomorph: Perthecia immersed, flask-shaped, glabrous. Perithecial wall leathery, consisting of distinct regions. Ostiolar canal periphysate. Paraphyses persistent. Asci unitunicate, 8-spored, cylindrical; ascal apex with nonamyloid (J–), refractive apical annulus. Ascospores ellipsoidal to fusiform, transversely septate, versicolorous, central cells brown, end cells hyaline. Anamorph: Conidiophores macronematous, mononematous, solitary or aggregated, simple, cylindrical, straight or slightly flexuous, smooth, septate or aseptate, brown to dark brown. Conidiogenous cells integrated or discrete, terminal or directly from hyphae, lageniform, doliiform, cylindrical, smooth, medium brown to brown, proliferation none or percurrent. Conidial ontogeny holoblastic. Conidia acrogenous, solitary, dry, cylindrical, obclavate, rostrate, fusiform, or narrowly clavate, obovoid to broadly obovoid, truncate at the base, rounded or appendaged at the apex, smooth or verruculose, distoseptate, cell lumina reduced, pale brown to brown; apical appendage absent or present, filamentous, septate, pale brown (Adapted Réblová and Winka 2001; Wu and Zhuang 2005).

Ecology/Substrate/Host: on wood, bamboo culm or plant remnants in terrestrial and freshwater habitats.

Geographical distribution: Broadly distributed and known from many countries.

Description and illustration: Subramanian (1992); Wu and Zhuang (2005).

Notes: Ellisembia, based on E. coronata, is a segregated genus from Sporidesmium Link by Subramanian (1992) to accommodate those previously described Sporidesmium without or with percurrently proliferating conidiogenous cells, and distoseptate conidia (McKenzie 1995; Goh and Hyde 1999; Wu and Zhuang 2005). The criteria used for species identification in the genus are number of proliferation in conidiogenous cells and conidial morphology such as shape, size and septation. Teleomorphs of Ellisembia were found from four species, i.e., Ellisembia adscendens with Miyoshiella triseptata (Shoemaker & White) Réblová as teleomorph; Ellisembia aurea described with both anamorph and teleomorph, Ellisembia bambusicola with Miyoshiella fusispora as teleomorph; Ellisembia folliculata with Lecythothecium duriligni as teleomorph (Shoemaker and White 1985; Réblová 1999a; Réblová and Winka 2001; Hyde 2019).

Recent phylogenetic analysis shows that the genus Ellisembia is polyphyletic and problematic in delimitation from Distoseptispora and Sporidesmium. It comprises more than 65 species but only some of them could be positioned in the system based on DNA sequence data (Hyde et al. 2019). Members of Ellisembia with DNA sequences available are placed in four clades in Sordariomycetes, i.e., in Chaetosphaeriaceae under the name Ellisembia, Distoseptisporaceae as Distoseptispora, Sporidesmiaceae as Sporidesmium and Xylariales as Ellisembia calyptrata (Réblová and Winka 2001; Shenoy et al. 2006; Su et al. 2016; Hyde et al. 2019). Future revision needs to include both morphological and molecular analysis of the types species (Réblová 1999a; Réblová and Winka 2001; Shoemaker and Hambleton 2001; Wu and Zhuang 2005; Shenoy et al. 2006; Mena Portales et al. 2016; Su et al. 2016; Luo et al. 2018; Yang et al. 2018b; Hyde et al. 2019; Sun et al. 2020; Hsieh et al. 2021). Among the many known species under Ellisembia, only three species, Ellisembia aurea, E. brachypus and E. folliculata, are assigned to Chaetosphaeriaceae (Réblová and Winka 2001; Shenoy et al. 2006; Magyar et al. 2011; Hyde et al. 2019). However, their phylogenetic relationship with the type species, E. coronata, is not known, thus placement of the genus Ellisembia in Chaetosphaeriaceae needs to be further confirmed when the DNA sequence data will be available from fresh collection of the type species. Réblová (2019) recommended using the name Ellisembia for species grouped in a strongly supported monophyletic clade in Chaetosphaeriaceae, experimentally linked with sexual morphs having multiseptate, versicolorous ascospores in asci with a non-amyloid apical annulus, persistent paraphyses and immersed ascomata.

Species of the genus occurs as saprobes on wood, bamboo culm or plant remnants in terrestrial and freshwater habitats. Many species under the genus Ellisembia have been reported from China (Wu and Zhuang 2005). However, only three species, E. aurea, E. brachypus and E. folliculata, are phylogenetically assigned to Chaetosphaeriaceae based on available DNA data, while most other species are to be studied. Here we add a new species, E. reblovae to the genus.

Type species: Ellisembia coronata (Fuckel) Subram.

Other accepted species: Species Fungorum – search Ellisembia.

References

Goh TK, Hyde KD 1999 – Fungi on submerged wood and bamboo in the Plover Cove Reservoir, Hong Kong. Fungal Divers 3:57–85.

Hsieh SY, Goh TK, Kuo CH 2021 – A taxonomic revision of Stanjehughesia (Chaetosphaeriaceae, Sordariomycetes), with a novel species S kaohsiungensis from Taiwan. Phytotaxa 484:261–280.

Luo ZL, Hyde KD, Liu JK, Bhat DJ, Bao DF, Li WL, Su HY 2018 – Lignicolous freshwater fungi from China II: Novel Distoseptispora (Distoseptisporaceae) species from northwestern Yunnan Province and a suggested unified method for studying lignicolous freshwater fungi. Mycosphere 9:444–461.

Magyar D, Shoemaker RA, Bobvos J, Crous PW, Groenewald JZ 2011 – Pyrigmemmula, a novel hyphomycete genus on grapevine and tree bark. Mycol Prog 10:307–314.

McKenzie EHC 1995 – Dematiaceous hyphomycetes on Pandanaceae 5 Sporidesmium snsu. lato. Mycotaxon 56:9–29.

Mena Portales J, Hernández-Restrepo M, Guarro J, Minter DW, Gené J 2016 – New species of Penzigomyces, Sporidesmium and Stanjehughesia from plant debris in Spain. Nova Hedwigia 103:359–371.

Réblová M 1999a – Studies in Chaetosphaeria sensu lato III Umbrinosphaeria gen. nov. and Miyoshiella with Sporidesmium anamorphs. Mycotaxon 71:13–43.

Réblová M, Winka K 2001 – Generic concepts and correlations in ascomycetes based on molecular and morphological data: Lecythothecium duriligni gen. et sp. nov. with a Sporidesmium anamorph, and Ascolacicola austriaca sp. nov. Mycologia 93:478–493.

Shenoy BD, Jeewon R, Wu WP, Bhat DJ, Hyde KD 2006 – Ribosomal and RPB2 DNA sequence analyses suggest that Sporidesmium and morphologically similar genera are polyphyletic. Mycol Res 110:916–928.