Paecilomyces formosus Urquhart, J.

Yang, Erfu, Karunarathna, Samantha C., Shao, Shicheng, Han, Lisu, Samarakoon, Milan C., Elgorban, Abdallah M., Chiu, Chuni, Tibpromma, Saowaluck & Promputtha, Itthayakorn, 2025, Additions to Termitomyces aurantiacus growing termite comb-associated fungi, Phytotaxa 690 (2), pp. 212-230 : 218-219

Paecilomyces formosus Urquhart, J. Fungi 9 (3, no. 285): 9 (2023)

Index Fungorum number: IF846977

Harboured in termite fungus gardens. Hyphae 3–5 μm (x = 4 μm, n = 20) wide, branched, septate, hyaline to subhyaline, thick-walled, verruculose, septate, sometimes with terminal clusters. Asexual morph: Conidiophores 6–15 × 1–2 μm (x = 8 × 1.5 μm, n = 20), elongated, septate, branched, hyaline, bearing tubular, erect, terminal or lateral, aseptate, conidiogenous cells with terminal conidia. Conidia 6–9 × 3–6 μm (x = 8 × 4.5 μm, n = 20), ellipsoidal to ovoid, hyaline to yellow-brown, often carrying part of conidiogenous cells at the base when liberated. Sexual morph: Undetermined.

Culture characteristics: Colonies fast growing on PDA and reaching around 80 mm diam after one month; fungal strains sporulated within one week in PDA. Obverse: effuse, circular, lowly dense, dull, yellowish brown to brown with maturity. Reverse: brown. In PDA, no pigments were observed.

Substrata: Annona squamosa , bone marrow of human ( Samson et al. 2009); quebracho-tanned sheep leather, wood of Lecythis unsitata , botanical specimen, soil, raw material of dessert ( Ueda et al. 2010); endophytic on Helianthus annuus ( Bulla et al. 2017) ; pathogenic on pistachio trees ( Torabi et al. 2019); chronic granulomatous disease of an adult patient ( Heshmatnia et al. 2017); termite fungus gardens (this study).

Distribution: Uzbekistan ( Samson et al. 2009); France, Thailand, Japan ( Ueda et al. 2010); Brazil ( Ueda et al. 2010; Bulla et al. 2017), Iran ( Heshmatnia et al. 2017, Torabi et al. 2019); China ( Ueda et al. 2010, this study).

Material examined: China, Yunnan Province, Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden, isolated from active termite fungus gardens. 20 July 2022, E. F. Yang, C 2, ( HKAS 129051), living culture KUNCC 22-12517. GenBank numbers, ITS: PP915824, tub2: PP918923.

Notes: The BLASTn searches of ITS, LSU, and tub2 of our isolate KUNCC 22-12517 show a 99–100% similarity to Paecilomyces formosus ( CBS 296.93, CBS 990.73 B, DTO 45 H 8, FRR 3793, WGS 11736). The colonies in PDA share similar morphology with previously reported Paecilomyces formosus (strain IG 03) by having yellow-brown under naturally reflected light and a rough surface ( Bulla et al. 2017). Also, the micro-morphology of our isolate well fits the general concept of Paecilomyces species ( Figure 5 ), with high diversity in conidial shape and size, featured by catenated, basocatenate, ellipsoidal to subfusiform, brown to yellow-brown conidia ( Samson et al. 2009). In addition, the phylogram of combined ITS and tub2 sequences indicated that our isolate KUNCC 22-12517 was allied to Paecilomyces formosus strains ( CBS 296.93, CBS 990.73 B). Therefore, we report Paecilomyces formosus KUNCC 22-12517 from termite fungus gardens for the first time.

Figures

FIGURE 5. Paecilomyces formosus (HKAS129051): (a) Colony on PDA, (b) Mycelium with conidia, (d,e,i) Conidiophores bearing conidia, (f–h) Conidiophores bearing conidia stained by congo red dye, (j,k) Immature to mature conidia.