Neozygites osornensis sp. nov., a fungal species causing mortality to the cypress aphid Cinara cupressi in Chile

Abstract

An entomophthoralean fungus causing epizootics in populations of the cypress aphid, Cinara cupressi Buckton, in Chile is described as a new species, Neozygites osornensis Montalva et Barta. The aphid pathogen is described based on morphological characters. An exhaustive description, illustrations and a comparison with closely related species are provided. The fungus differs from similar Neozygites species by smaller hyphal bodies, nuclei, primary conidia, capilliconidia and capilliphores and by noticeably different shape of capilliconidia. A key to aphid-pathogenic species of Neozygites is also included.

Estimating current and future range shifts of exotic species as a tool for protected-area threat assessment in Chile

“…We retrieved the Worldclim2 bioclimatic variables (Fick and Hijmans, 2017) with a spatial resolution of ca.1 km 2 . The occurrence dataset for all TES was extracted from the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF, 2018) and previous studies (Baldini et al, 2008;Retamal et al, 2013;Ruiz et al, 2014) (for details, refer to Table S1). We considered a global niche (fundamental niche) approach, aiming to generate a pessimistic prediction of all the climatic conditions under which the species can occur (Gallien et al, 2012); also, the lack of national occurrences for some species could generate a sub estimation of some ES (Pauchard et al, 2011).…”

Microbial Control of Invasive Forest Pests with Entomopathogenic Fungi: A Review of the Current Situation

“…A survey of entomopathogenic fungi of C. cupressi , was carried out in southern Chile (project DID 2011-11) between 2007 and 2013. Several strains of Lecanicillium attenuatum were isolated and a Neozygites species wasreported from naturally infected C. cupressi cadavers (Figure 1) in different localities [17,101]. Several laboratory studies around the world demonstrated high levels of mortality in C. cupressi with entomopathogenic fungi of the order Hypocreales, especially with Lecanicillium sp.…”

“…However, field efficacy varies considerably as these fungi are strongly influenced by the environmental conditions such as humidity and temperature. On the other hand, some fungi of the order Neozygitales were cited and collected in different locations in Chile [101,105,106]. For example, Neozygites turbinata (Kenneth) Remaudière and Keller and Neozygites osornensis Montalva and Barta are highly specific to certain aphids and can cause epizootics in pest populations, and they can also be multiplied as protoplasts or hyphal bodies.…”