Novel species of microfungi described in the present study include the following from Australia: Phytophthora amnicola from still water, Gnomoniopsis smithogilvyi from Castanea sp., Pseudoplagiostoma corymbiae from Corymbia sp., Diaporthe eucalyptorum from Eucalyptus sp., Sporisorium andrewmitchellii from Enneapogon aff. lindleyanus, Myrmecridium banksiae from Banksia, and Pilidiella wangiensis from Eucalyptus sp. Several species are also described from South Africa, namely: Gondwanamyces wingfieldii from Protea caffra, Montagnula aloes from Aloe sp., Diaporthe canthii from Canthium inerne, Phyllosticta ericarum from Erica gracilis, Coleophoma proteae from Protea caffra, Toxicocladosporium strelitziae from Strelitzia reginae, and Devriesia agapanthi from Agapanthus africanus. Other species include Phytophthora asparagi from Asparagus officinalis (USA), and Diaporthe passiflorae from Passiflora edulis (South America). Furthermore, novel genera of coelomycetes include Chrysocrypta corymbiae from Corymbia sp. (Australia), Trinosporium guianense, isolated as a contaminant (French Guiana), and Xenosonderhenia syzygii, from Syzygium cordatum (South Africa). Pseudopenidiella piceae from Picea abies (Czech Republic), and Phaeocercospora colophospermi from Colophospermum mopane (South Africa) represent novel genera of hyphomycetes. Morphological and culture characteristics along with ITS DNA barcodes are provided for all taxa.

No abstract

The co-occurrence of plant species within a community is influenced by local deterministic or neutral processes as well as historical regional processes. Floral trait distributions of co-flowering species that share pollinators may reflect the impact of pollinator preference and constancy on their assembly within local communities. While pollinator sharing may lead to increased visitation rates for species with similar flowers, the receipt of foreign pollen via interspecific pollinator movements can decrease seed set. We investigated the pattern of community flower colour assembly as perceived by native honeybee pollinators within 24 local assemblages of co-flowering Oxalis species within the Greater Cape Floristic Region, South Africa. To explore the influence of pollinators on trait assembly, we assessed the impact of colour similarity on pollinator choices and the cost of heterospecific pollen receipt. We show that flower colour is significantly clustered within Oxalis communities and that this is not due to historical constraint, as flower colour is evolutionarily labile within Oxalis and communities are randomly structured with respect to phylogeny. Pollinator observations reveal that the likelihood of pollinators switching between co-flowering species is low and increases with flower colour similarity. Interspecific hand pollination significantly reduced seed set in the four Oxalis species we investigated, and all were dependant on pollinators for reproduction. Together these results imply that flower colour similarity carries a potential fitness cost. However, pollinators were highly flower constant, and remained so despite the extreme similarity of flower colour as perceived by honeybees. This suggests that other floral traits facilitate discrimination between similarly coloured species, thereby likely resulting in a low incidence of interspecific pollen transfer (IPT). If colour similarity promotes pollinator attraction at the community level, the observed clustering of flower colour within communities might result from indirect facilitative interactions.

Phylogenetics benefits from using a large number of putatively independent nuclear loci and their combination with other sources of information, such as the plastid and mitochondrial genomes. To facilitate the selection of orthologous low-copy nuclear (LCN) loci for phylogenetics in nonmodel organisms, we created an automated and interactive script to select hundreds of LCN loci by a comparison between transcriptome and genome skim data. We used our script to obtain LCN genes for southern African Oxalis (Oxalidaceae), a speciose plant lineage in the Greater Cape Floristic Region. This resulted in 1164 LCN genes greater than 600 bp. Using target enrichment combined with genome skimming (Hyb-Seq), we obtained on average 1141 LCN loci, nearly the whole plastid genome and the nrDNA cistron from 23 southern African Oxalis species. Despite a wide range of gene trees, the phylogeny based on the LCN genes was very robust, as retrieved through various gene and species tree reconstruction methods as well as concatenation. Cytonuclear discordance was strong. This indicates that organellar phylogenies alone are unlikely to represent the species tree and stresses the utility of Hyb-Seq in phylogenetics.

The majority of plant pathogens are fungi and many of these adversely affect food security. This mini-review aims to provide an analysis of the plant pathogenic fungi for which genome sequences are publically available, to assess their general genome characteristics, and to consider how genomics has impacted plant pathology. A list of sequenced fungal species was assembled, the taxonomy of all species verified, and the potential reason for sequencing each of the species considered. The genomes of 1090 fungal species are currently (October 2016) in the public domain and this number is rapidly rising. Pathogenic species comprised the largest category (35.5 %) and, amongst these, plant pathogens are predominant. Of the 191 plant pathogenic fungal species with available genomes, 61.3 % cause diseases on food crops, more than half of which are staple crops. The genomes of plant pathogens are slightly larger than those of other fungal species sequenced to date and they contain fewer coding sequences in relation to their genome size. Both of these factors can be attributed to the expansion of repeat elements. Sequenced genomes of plant pathogens provide blueprints from which potential virulence factors were identified and from which genes associated with different pathogenic strategies could be predicted. Genome sequences have also made it possible to evaluate adaptability of pathogen genomes and genomic regions that experience selection pressures. Some genomic patterns, however, remain poorly understood and plant pathogen genomes alone are not sufficient to unravel complex pathogen-host interactions. Genomes, therefore, cannot replace experimental studies that can be complex and tedious. Ultimately, the most promising application lies in using fungal plant pathogen genomics to inform disease management and risk assessment strategies. This will ultimately minimize the risks of future disease outbreaks and assist in preparation for emerging pathogen outbreaks.

Monosulcate pollen can be obtained from several developmental pathways, leading thus to homoplasy in the monosulcate character state. Monosulcate pollen should not therefore be considered as the ancestral state unless it is produced through the ancestral developmental pathway. The question about the ancestral developmental pathway leading to monosulcy remains open.

Despite being a speciose component of the Cape Floristic Region at the southern tip of Africa, the southern African Oxalis lineage is systematically poorly understood. Palynological and preliminary phylogenetic studies of the group contrast with the current taxonomy, and indicate the need for further research. Here we present a largescale phylogenetic analysis comprising 150 of ± 210 southern African species, sampled for plastid trnL–F and trnS–G and nuclear ITS markers, using three different inference methods. Secondly, we explore the origins of southern African Oxalis as a potential Cape clade. Despite substantial localised incongruence between plastid and nuclear datasets, analyses agreed on a monophyletic southern African clade, which consists of two species–poor and one extremely species–rich lineages. The current taxonomy is shown to be artificial, with not one section retrieved as monophyletic. Our topologies are consistent with previous palynological and phylogenetic studies, and provide a backbone for future systematic work. Reconstructions of ancestral area for the southern African lineage support an origin within or close to the Cape Floristic Region.

Ophiostomatoid fungi are well known as economically important pathogens and agents of timber degradation. A unique assemblage of these arthropod-associated organisms including species of Gondwanamyces G. J. Marais and M. J. Wingf., and Ophiostoma Syd. and P. Syd. occur in the floral heads (infructescences) of Protea L. species in South Africa. It has recently been discovered that Ophiostoma found in Protea flower-heads are vectored by mites (Acarina) including species of: Tarsonemus Canestrini and Fonzago, Proctolaelaps Berlese, and Trichouropoda Berlese. It is, however, not known how the mites carry the fungi between host plants. In this study, we consider two possible modes of mite dispersal. These include self-dispersal between infructescences and dispersal through insect vectors. Results showed that, as infructescences desiccate, mites self-disperse to fresh moist infructescences. Long-range dispersal is achieved through a phoretic association with three beetle species: Genuchus hottentottus (F.), Trichostetha fascicularis L., and T. capensis L. The long-range, hyperphoretic dispersal of O. splendens G. J. Marais and M. J. Wingf. and O. phasma Roets et al. seemed effective, because their hosts were colonized during the first flowering season 3-4 yr after fire.