Cyanoboletus macroporus (Boletaceae), a new bolete species from Pakistani forests Samina

Abstract

Cyanoboletus macroporus belonging to C. pulverulentus species complex is designated as a new species from the moist temperate and sub-alpine oak forests of Pakistan after in depth macroscopic, microscopic and phylogenetic analyses using the ITS region of nrDNA as well as comparison with allied taxa. This species belonging to Boletoid group is morphologically distinguished from allied taxa (Cyanoboletus flavosanguineus, C. hymenoglutinosus, C. pulverulentus, C. rainisii, and C. sinopulverulentus) by wider openings of pores. C. macroporus is also phylogenetically distinct from C. sinopulverulentus and C. pulverulentus, the most closely related species. Phylogenetic analysis outlined the existence of previously unknown species of this genus. Field photographs of fresh basidocarps and line drawings of micro-characters are provided along with a phylogenetic tree as well as a comparison table and a key of distinctive features of all the species in this genus. This is the first authentic species belonging to Cyanoboletus from Pakistan. Previously, only C. pulverulentus has been mentioned in literature, but no morphological data is available regarding this report. With the addition of this taxon, species number of Cyanoboletus will increase to eight. From Pakistan, despite of the fact that there is great diversity of mushrooms in moist temperate areas (Yousaf et al. 2012), this is the first study that describes a species belonging to Cyanoboletus genus. Previously only one ambiguous species, Cyanoboletus pulverulentus, has been mentioned in literature (Iqbal & Khalid 1996), but with no available materials that could confirm this finding. In this study, Cyanoboletus macroporus is described as a new to science and increase the current species number of Cyanoboletus to eight.