Torula dispora H. Z. Du, N. Wu, K. D. Hyde & Jian K. Liu, 2025

Torula dispora H. Z. Du, N. Wu, K. D. Hyde & Jian K. Liu sp. nov.

Fig. 3 View Figure 3

Etymology.

The epithet ‘ dispora ’ refers to the host genus Disporum from which the fungus was originally isolated.

Holotype.

HKAS 132495 View Materials

Description.

Saprobic on dead twigs of Disporum cantoniense (Loureiro) Merrill ( Liliaceae ). Sexual morph: Undetermined. Asexual morph: Hyphomycetous. Colonies effuse on the natural substrate, scattered, hairy, dark brown to black, dry. Mycelium mostly immersed, hyaline, septate, branched hyphae. Conidiophores 15–40 × 4–6 μm ( x ̄ = 32 × 5 μm, n = 20), micronematous to semi-macronematous, subcylindrical, erect, septate, smooth, straight, or slightly flexuous, brown to dark brown. Conidiogenous cells 5–8 × 4–5 μm ( x ̄ = 7 × 4.5 μm, n = 20), monoblastic, integrated, terminal, subglobose or spherical to coronal, brown to dark brown. Conidia two types; short conidia 16–35 × 5–9 μm ( x ̄ = 27 × 7 μm, n = 30), acrogenous, phragmosporous, branched in chains with subglobose cells, dry, brown to dark brown, subhyaline at the terminal cell, 4–9 - septate, constricted at septa, and the central cells larger than end cells, verrucose, easily separating, with spinulose on the substrate; long conidia 178–389 × 4–6 μm ( x ̄ = 256 × 5 μm, n = 30), acrogenous, phragmosporous, dry, straight to flexuous, pale brown to brown, terminal cell subhyaline, 20–40 - septate, constricted at septa, verrucose, easily separating, fusiform to ellipsoidal cells and uniform in size.

Culture characteristics.

Conidia germinated on the PDA within 24 h, and germ tubes are produced from the basal cell. Colonies growing on PDA reached 45–48 mm in diam. after three weeks at 25 ° C in the dark. Colonies from above irregular, mycelium slightly raised, fluffy, filiform, white aerial hyphae at the surface, spreading from the center, and hyaline mycelium at the edge; in reverse, brown to dark-brown in the center, with grayish white at the edge, the color gradually lightens from the center to the edge.

Material examined.

China • Sichuan Province, Chengdu City, Dujiangyan City, Qingcheng Mountain scenic spot , 30°55'9"N, 103°28'36"E, elevation 1,185 m, on dead twigs of Disporum cantoniense ( Liliaceae ), 27 March 2021, H. Z. Du, S 173 ( HKAS 132495 , holotype), ex-type living culture CGMCC 3.27461 GoogleMaps ; • ibid., S 82 ( HUEST 23.0504 ), living culture UESTCC 23.0503 GoogleMaps .

Notes.

Multi-locus phylogeny (Fig. 1 View Figure 1 ) showed that Torula dispora ( CGMCC 3.27461 and UESTCC 23.0503 ) clustered together with T. longiconidiophora ( CGMCC 3.24283 ) and T. sundara ( MFLUCC 21-0067 ) with high support (99 % MLBS / 1.00 BIPP), forming a distinct lineage. Morphologically, T. dispora ( HKAS 132495 , holotype) is similar to T. longiconidiophora and T. sundara in having micronematous to semi-macronematous conidiophores, terminal, subglobose or spherical to coronal conidiogenous cells, and two types of conidia (short and long) forming in chains ( Jayawardena et al. 2022; Tian et al. 2023). However, T. dispora ( HKAS 132495 , holotype) can be distinguished from T. longiconidiophora and T. sundara by the spinulose characteristics on the conidial substrate ( Jayawardena et al. 2022; Tian et al. 2023). In addition, T. dispora differs from T. sundara by its smaller short-type conidia (16–35 × 5–9 μm vs. 41–60 × 9–15 μm) and fewer septa in conidia (20–40 vs. up to 50) ( Jayawardena et al. 2022). The nucleotide base pair comparison between T. dispora ( CGMCC 3.27461 , ex-type strain) and T. sundara ( KUNCC 22-12399 ) revealed 10 / 509 bp (2.0 %, 2 gaps) in ITS, 16 / 900 bp (1.8 %, 4 gaps) in tef 1 - α, and 24 / 885 bp (2.7 %, without gaps) in rpb 2 differences ( He et al. 2024), while T. dispora ( CGMCC 3.27461 ) can be distinguished from T. longiconidiophora ( CGMCC 3.24283 , ex-type strain) by 11 / 519 bp (2.1 %, 3 gaps) in ITS and 33 / 982 bp (3.3 %, without gaps) in rpb 2 sequence data ( Tian et al. 2023). Therefore, based on the morphological and phylogenetic evidence ( Jeewon and Hyde 2016), T. dispora , associated with the medicinal plant Disporum cantoniense , is introduced as a new species from Sichuan Province, China.