Magnaporthiopsis zoysiae H. Liu & H. Sang, 2025

Liu, Haifeng, Choi, Hyeongju, Paul, Narayan Chandra, Ariyawansa, Hiran A. & Sang, Hyunkyu, 2025, Discovering fungal communities in roots of Zoysia japonica and characterising novel species and their antifungal activities, IMA Fungus 16, pp. e 138479-e 138479 : e138479-

Magnaporthiopsis zoysiae H. Liu & H. Sang sp. nov.

Fig. 12

Etymology.

Name refers to its host Zoysia japonica.

Description from living culture CMML 20-39 .

Sexual morph: undetermined. Asexual morph: Sporulation observed on OA media. Conidiophores hyaline, single or sometimes branched, septate. Conidiogenous cells erect or curved, hyaline, 2.5–4 μm in width. Conidia ovoid or cylindrical, hyaline, slightly curved, 5.5–14.5 × 3.0–5.2 μm (Fig. 12 b – h ).

Type.

Korea • South Jeolla Province, Hwasun , isolated from roots of Zoysia japonica , October 2020, H. Liu and H. Sang, holotype CMML 20-39 H (permanently preserved in a metabolically inactive state), ex-holotype CMML 20-39 , ex-isotype CMML 20-92 .

Culture characteristics.

Colony reaching 31.81 mm diam. after 7 days in darkness at 25 ° C on PDA, centre dark, margin white, mycelia frizzy (Fig. 12 a ).

Notes.

In phylogenetic analysis of Magnaporthiopsis , based on sequences of six genes (ITS, SSU, LSU, RPB 1, TEF 1 and MCM 7), the strains used in the present study CMML 20-39 and CMML 20-92 fell into a distinct clade with a high statistical support (100 % / 1.00) (Fig. 13 ), sister to clades of species M. cynodontis , M. agrostidis and M. meyeri-festucae , which are all turf-grass-associated species. Morphologically, the conidial size of these two strains is larger than those of M. agrostidis (4–6 × 1 µm; Crous et al. (2015)) and M. meyeri-festucae (3–5 × 1–2.5 µm; Luo et al. (2017)). Conidia of these two strains is slightly longer than M. cynodontis (7–13 × 2–6.5 µm; Vines et al. (2020)). Therefore, based on phylogenetic analysis and morphological characteristics, Magnaporthiopsis zoysiae sp. nov. was introduced in this study.

Figures

Figure 12. Magnaporthiopsis zoysiae sp. nov. (CMML 20-39) a front and reverse sides of colony on PDA b – e sporulation pattern on OA media f conidia. Scale bars: 3 μm.

Figure 13. Maximum Likelihood phylogenetic tree, based on combined sequences of ITS, SSU, LSU, RPB 1, TEF 1 and MCM 7 from Magnaporthiopsis species. Bootstrap values (BS) and Bayesian posterior probabilities (PP) are given at the nodes (BS / PP). Strains obtained from this study are in bold blue. Ex-type isolates are marked with T. Pyricularia grisea (M 82) was used as the outgroup taxon.