A new species of Herpomyces (Laboulbeniomycetes: Herpomycetales) on Periplaneta fuliginosa (Blattodea: Blattidae) from Argentina

ABSTRACT

We are becoming increasingly aware of the dazzling diversity of fungi—new taxa are being discovered from poorly sampled habitats and integrative approaches point at (near-)cryptic species in many groups. The class Laboulbeniomycetes, which is composed of three orders (Herpomycetales, Laboulbeniales, Pyxidiophorales), is no exception. However, still, in the orders Herpomycetales and Laboulbeniales, species are predominantly described based on morphology alone. Here, we present a new species of Herpomyces from Argentina parasitic on Periplaneta fuliginosa, the smokybrown cockroach. Herpomyces spegazzinii, sp. nov., is characterized based on morphology and molecular data. Phylogenetic inference based on internal transcribed spacer (ITS, consisting of ITS1-5.8S-ITS2) barcode region supports the status of this fungus as a separate species, sister to the recently described H. shelfordellae.

KEYWORDS:

• Cockroaches
• ectoparasitic fungi
• Laboulbeniomycetes
• phylogeny
• taxonomy
• 1 new taxon

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We are grateful to Dr. Danny Haelewaters (Department of Botany and Plant Pathology, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana) for assistance with the description of the new species, to Lic. Luis Guiambelluca for assistance with microphotography, and to two anonymous reviewers.

Supplementary material

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Additional information

Funding

This study was partially supported by Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Argentina, Universidad Nacional de La Plata (UNLP) (11N 659 y 11N 780), Argentina, and Agencia Nacional de Promoción Científica y Tecnológica (ANPCYT) (PICT 2016-0483), Argentina.