Abstract
Pleurotremataceae species are saprobes on decaying wood in terrestrial, mangrove, and freshwater habitats. The generic boundary of the family has traditionally been based on morphology. All genera of Pleurotremataceae have a high degree of morphological overlap, of which the generic circumscription of Melomastia and Dyfrolomyces has not been well resolved. Thus, the delimitation of genera has always been challenging. Melomastia traditionally differs from Dyfrolomyces in having 2-septate, oblong, with obtuse-ends ascospores. These main characteristics have been used to distinguish Melomastia from Dyfrolomyces for a long time. However, the above characteristics sometimes overlap among Dyfrolomyces and Melomastia species. Based on the morphology and multigene phylogeny with newly obtained data, we synonymized Dyfrolomyces under Melomastia following up-to-date results. Four novel species (i.e., Melomastia fusispora, M. oleae, M. sichuanensis and M. winteri) collected from the dead branches of Olea europaea L. in Chengdu Olive Base, Sichuan Province in China are introduced based on detailed morphological characterization and phylogenetic analyses of sequences based on nuclear ribosomal (LSU and SSU) and protein-coding gene (tef1-α). The 11 new combinations proposed are Melomastia aquatica (=Dyfrolomyces aquaticus), M. chromolaenae (=D. chromolaenae), M. distoseptata (=D. distoseptatus), M. mangrovei (=D. mangrovei), M. marinospora (=D. marinosporus), M. neothailandica (=D. neothailandicus), M. phetchaburiensis (=D. phetchaburiensis), M. sinensis (=D. sinensis), M. thailandica (=D. thailandica), M. thamplaensis (=D. thamplaensis) and M. tiomanensis (=D. tiomanensis).
Highlights
The family Pleurotremataceae was introduced by Watson [1] for the monotypic genusPleurotrema Müll
Nine strains obtained in this study were grouped in Pleurotremataceae and represented four new species viz. Melomastia fusispora, M. oleae, M. sichuanensis and
Norphanphoum et al [18] proposed combining Dyfrolomyces and Pleurotrema under Melomastia based on similar phenotypic characteristics, and they suggested this taxonomic assumption needs to be reinforced via increasing the number of taxa with sequence data in each genus
Summary
The family Pleurotremataceae was introduced by Watson [1] for the monotypic genusPleurotrema Müll. Arg. with P. polysemum as the type of species. Barr assigned Pleurotremataceae to Xylariales and accepted five genera, viz. Daruvedia Dennis., Melomastia Nitschke ex. Arg. and Saccardoella Speg., based on their unitunicate and non-fissitunicate ascal characteristics [2]. Melomastia and Saccardoella were referred to Ascomycota genera incertae sedis [5,6], while Pleurotrema was retained in Pyrenulales [7]. The familial placement of Pleurotrema has been controversial due to the confusion over the nature of the asci, as they are neither typically unitunicate nor bitunicate [8,9]. The bitunicate, non-fissitunicate and not lichenized asci of Pleurotrema determined that it has morphological affinities to the genera Melomastia and Saccardoella. Based on the above evidence, Maharachchikumbura et al [13] excluded Pleurotremataceae from Sordariomycetes and placed it in Dothideomycetes
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