Diaporthe litseae Y.R. Sun, Yong Wang

Sun, Ya-Ru, Liu, Ning-Guo, Al-Otibi, Fatimah O., Hyde, Kevin D., Wang, Yong & Jayawardena, Ruvishika S., 2024, A new endophytic species, Diaporthe litseae, from medicinal plants in Guizhou Province, China, Phytotaxa 665 (3), pp. 243-252 : 248

publication ID	https://doi.org/10.11646/phytotaxa.665.3.6
persistent identifier	https://treatment.plazi.org/id/7A0987FC-FFF8-FFBA-FF57-FF5D7389FB8F
treatment provided by	Felipe
scientific name	Diaporthe litseae Y.R. Sun, Yong Wang
status	sp. nov.

Treatment

Diaporthe litseae Y.R. Sun, Yong Wang bis & K.D. Hyde, sp. nov.

Index Fungorum number: IF902549; Facesoffungi number: FoF 16399

Etymology: referring to the host genus.

Holotype: HGUP 24-0011

Endophytic on healthy leaves of Litsea kobuskiana . Sexual morph: Not observed. Asexual morph: Conidiomata superficial, solitary, scattered on the pine needle in the WA, dark brown to black, globose. Conidiophores 1–2 µm wide, aseptate, cylindrical, straight or sinuous, densely aggregated, terminal. Conidiogenous cells phialidic, cylindrical. Alpha conidia 5–9 × 2–3.5 μm (= 7 × 2.5 μm, n = 40), fusiform, hyaline, aseptate, 4–5-guttulate, both ends obtuse. Beta conidia not observed.

Material examined: China, Guizhou Province, Anshun City, Xixiu District, Yaowang Valley Tourism Resort , on heathy leaves of Litsea kobuskiana , 3 August 2022, Y. R. Sun, MJZY1-1 ( HGUP 24-0011 , holotype) ; ex-type living culture GUCC 23-0022 ; ibid, on heathy leaves of Litsea kobuskiana , 3 August 2022, Y. R. Sun, MJZY1 ( HGUP 23- 0008 , living culture GUCC 24-0055 ) .

Notes: BLASTn searches of the ITS sequence of Diaporthe litseae resulted in 97.6% similarity with D.citrichinensis (synonym: D. ukurunduensis ) (W2). The BLASTn results of cal and tef1-α are 92.26% and 88.85% similar to D. citri (SICAUCC 22-0129) and D. citri (ZGPF1), respectively. The multi-gene analyses showed D. litseae is close to D. citri and forms a sister clade to the D. citrichinensis species complex ( Fig. 1 View FIGURE 1 ). In morphology, Diaporthe litseae differs from D. citri by its fusiform, 4–5-guttulate, smaller and thinner alpha conidia (7 × 2.5 μm vs. 8.5 × 3.7 μm, L/W: 2.8 vs. 2.3) while the latter has ovate to ellipsoidal, 1–2 guttules alpha conidia ( Udayanga et al. 2014b; Hongsanan et al. 2023). Therefore, we introduce D. litseae as a novel species and not belonging to any species complex following the recent literature ( Jeewon & Hyde 2016; Jayawardena et al. 2021; Dissanayake et al. 2024).