Neocucurbitaria
Neocucurbitaria Wanas., E.B.G. Jones & K.D. Hyde, et al., Mycosphere 8(3): 408 (2017)
Facesoffungi number: FoF 02902
Dothideomycetes, Pleosporomycetidae, Pleosporales, Cucurbitariaceae
Saprobic on the host plant or animal dung or isolated from human body. Sexual morph: see Wanasinghe et al. (2017). Asexual morph: Conidiomata dark brown to black, pycnidial, solitary to gregarious or confluent, immersed to semi-immersed, globose to subglobose, unilocular, papillate, setose, ostiolate. Ostiole circular, single, centrally located. Conidiomatal setae brown, septate, branched, smooth-walled. Conidiomatal wall composed of thick-walled, brown to hyaline cells of textura angularis. Conidiophores usually reduced to conidiogenous cells. Conidiogenous cells hyaline, enteroblastic, phialidic, subcylindrical to lageniform, arising from the inner wall layer of the conidiomata. Conidia hyaline, cylindrical or ellipsoidal, unicellular, guttulate, smooth-walled.
Type species: Neocucurbitaria unguis-hominis (Punith. & M.P. English) Wanas., E.B.G. Jones & K.D. Hyde et al., Mycosphere 8(3): 412 (2017)
= Pyrenochaeta unguis-hominis Punith. & M.P. English, Trans. Br. mycol. Soc. 64(3): 539 (1975)
Notes: Neocucurbitaria can be confused with Pyrenochaeta as they both have setose pycnidia producing hyaline, unicellular conidia. The conidiophores of Neocucurbitaria are usually unbranched, or reduced to conidiogenous cells, whereas those of Pyrenochaeta are branched, filiform, septate, and acropleurogenous (Sutton 1980, Wanasinghe et al. 2017, De Gruyter et al. 2010). Neocucurbitaria was placed in Cucurbitariaceae (Wanasinghe et al. 2017). However, the placement of Pyrenochaeta remains ambiguous after several phylogenetic studies and needs further revision (Aveskampet al. 2010, De Gruyter et al. 2010, Valenzuela-Lopez et al. 2018).
Twenty-two species are accepted in Neocucurbitaria (Index Fungorum 2019). They are saprobes or human pathogens, for example, N. unguis-hominis can cause infection of human skin and nails (de Gruyter et al. 2010, Toh et al. 2016). We examined a fungus on rodent dung, which shows a similar morphology of conidiomata, conidiogenous cells, and conidia with Neocucurbitaria. However, it lacks molecular data and thus we keep it as Neocucurbitaria sp. The taxonomy of this species needs further investigations based on fresh collections and phylogenetic inferences.
Distribution: Australia, Israel, Canada, Germany, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Montenegro, Spain, Ukraine, USA (Wanasinghe et al. 2017, Valenzuela-Lopez et al. 2018, Crous et al. 2019).
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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