Venturiales

Abstract

Members of Venturiales (Dothideomycetes) are widely distributed, and comprise saprobes, as well as plant, human and animal pathogens. In spite of their economic importance, the general lack of cultures and DNA data has resulted in taxa being poorly resolved. In the present study five loci, ITS, LSU rDNA, tef1, tub2 and rpb2 are used for analysing 115 venturialean taxa representing 30 genera in three families in the current classification of Venturiales. Based on the multigene phylogenetic analysis, morphological and ecological characteristics, one new family, Cylindrosympodiaceae, and eight new genera are described, namely Bellamyces, Fagicola, Fraxinicola, Fuscohilum, Neofusicladium, Parafusicladium, Pinaceicola and Sterila. In addition, 12 species are described as new to science, and 41 new combinations are proposed. The taxonomic status of 153 species have been re-evaluated with 20 species excluded from Venturiales. Based on this revision of Venturiales, morphological characteristics such as conidial arrangement (solitary or in chains) or conidiogenesis (blastic-solitary, sympodial or annellidic), proved to be significant at generic level. Venturia as currently defined represents a generic complex. Furthermore, plant pathogens appear more terminal in phylogenetic analyses within Venturiaceae and Sympoventuriaceae, suggesting that the ancestral state of Venturiales is most likely saprobic.