Fungalpedia – Note 1411, Neopestalotiopsis
Neopestalotiopsis. Maharachch., K.D. Hyde & Crous, in Maharachchikumbura, Hyde, Groenewald, Xu & Crous, Stud. Mycol. 79: 135 (2014).
Xylariomycetidae, Amphisphaeriales, Sporocadaceae, Neopestalotiopsis
Index Fungorum number: IF 809759; Facesoffungi number: FoF 05773; 43 species with sequence data.
Endophytic, pathogenic or saprobic. Asexual morph: Conidiomata solitary or aggregated, immersed to erumpent, acervular or pycnidial, dark brown to black, subglobose to globose, clavate, unilocular or irregularly plurilocular; showing dark brown to black conidia in a slimy, globose mass. Conidiophores indistinct, frequently reduced to conidiogenous cells. Conidiogenous cells hyaline, discrete, cylindrical, ampulliform to lageniform, smooth, thin-walled; conidiogenesis initially holoblastic, becoming percurrent to produce additional conidia at slightly higher levels. Conidia fusoid, ellipsoid to subcylindrical, straight to slightly curved, 4-septate; basal cell conic to subcylindrical, with a truncate base, pale brown or hyaline to olivaceous, thin and rugose to smooth-walled; three median cells doliiform, wall rugose to verruculose, versicoloured, septa darker than the rest of the cell; apical cell hyaline, conic to cylindrical, thin- and smooth-walled; with tubular apical appendages, one to many, filiform or attenuated, flexuous, branched or unbranched; basal appendage single, tubular, unbranched, centric. Sexual morph: undetermined (adapted from Maharachchikumbura et al., 2014).
Type species: Neopestalotiopsis protearum (Crous & L. Swart) Maharachch., K.D. Hyde & Crous, in Maharachchikumbura, Hyde, Groenewald, Xu & Crous, Stud. Mycol. 79: 147 (2014)
Notes: Neopestalotiopsis, established by Maharachchikumbura et al. (2014) is widespread, occurring as saprobes or pathogens on various host plants (Maharachchikumbura et al. 2014, Farr & Rossman 2019). The genus is distinct from Pestalotiopsis in having versicolourous median cells. Neopestalotiopsis rhizophorae is illustrated in this entry (notes from Hyde et al. 2020).