Dilophospora
Dilophospora Desm., Annls Sci. Nat., Bot., sér. 2 14: 6 (1840)
Ascomycota, genera incertae sedis
Parasitic on the host plant in terrestrial habitat. Sexual morph: undetermined. Asexual morph: Conidiomata dark brown, pycnidial, aggregated into elongate stromata between host veins, immersed, globose to subglobose, unilocular or multilocular, glabrous. Ostiole single to each locule, circular, papillate. Conidiomatal wall composed of thick-walled, dark brown cells of textura angularis in the exterior, becoming thick-walled, brown to dark brown elements of textura intricata on the exterior of conidiomatal wall and between aggregated conidiomata, merging with paler then hyaline cells toward hymenium. Conidiophores reduced to conidiogenous cells. Conidiogenous cells hyaline, enteroblastic, phialidic, ampulliform to lageniform, occasionally doliiform, discrete, determinate, smooth-walled, invested in mucus. Conidia hyaline, cylindrical, obtuse at both ends, 0–3-septate, smooth-walled, bearing appendages at each end; appendages tubular, 2–5, mostly dichotomously or irregularly branched, occasionally unbranched, maintaining protoplasmic continuity with the conidium body (Nag Raj 1993).
Type species: Dilophospora alopecuri (Fr.) Fr., Summa veg. Scand., Sectio Post.: 419 (1849)
Notes: Dilophospora was proposed by Desmazières (1840) for graminicolous pycnidial fungi, with D. graminis Desm. as type species, which is now known as Dilophospora alopecuri (Fr.) Fr. (Bessey 1906), based on Sphaeria alopecuri Fries (1828). Walker and Sutton (1974) revised Dilophospora and accepted only D. alopecuri in the genus, and listed D. graminis as a synonym. Nag Raj (1993) provided a detailed description and illustration for the generic type. The hyaline, cylindrical, septate conidia with dichotomously or irregularly branched appendages in Dilophospora resembles Pseudolachnella (especially for, P. coronata, P. brevifusiformis) (Nag Raj 1993). Pseudolachnella has cupulate, setose conidiomata, which differs in Dilophospora that are pycnidial, glabrous.
The sexual morph of D. alopecuri was assigned to Lidophia graminis (Sacc.) J. Walker & B. Sutton, as the latter with pseudothecia was found to occur mixed in the same stroma of D. alopecuri pycnidia. However, this connection has not been confirmed experimentally (Walker and Sutton 1974). Fresh collections of type species are needed to clarify the taxonomy of Dilophospora.
Distribution: Austria, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Commonwealth of Independent States (former U.S.S.R), Czech Republic, France, Germany, India, Iraq, Japan, Latvia, New Zealand, Romania, UK, USA, Yugoslavia (Walker and Sutton Nag Raj 1993, Riley 1994).
Dilophospora alopecuri (redrawn from Nag Raj 1993) a Conidia. b Conidiogenous cells and developing conidia.
References:
Li WJ, McKenZie EHC, Liu JK, Bhat DJ, Dai DQ, Caporesi E, Tian Q, Maharachcikumbura SSN, Luo ZL, Shang QJ, Zhang JF, Tangthirasunun N, Karunarathna SC, Xu JC, Hyde KD (2020) Taxonomy and phylogeny of hyaline-spored coelomycetes. Fungal Diversity 100: pages279–801.
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