Zagros is a mountainous region in western Asia, extending roughly along the western borders of Iran. In the past few years oak decline in the Zagros region has become a serious national concern in ...Iran, with multiple factors seemingly acting as causal agents. During field surveys recently made in central Zagros, signs of canker trunk rot on oaks and considerable damage were observed, caused by a resupinate polypore identified as Inonotus krawtzewii, previously known from the Russian Far East, China and central Europe. The identity of the fungus was confirmed by analyses of morphological characters and sequences of the nuclear ribosomal ITS region. A description of the species and illustrations are provided, and the symptoms are discussed. A key is given to the known resupinate species of Inonotus developing under bark. This is the first report of I. krawtzewii from western Asia and on Persian oak, and the first report of its invasiveness, at least partly contributing to the Zagros oak decline.
Members of Hymenochaetaceae fungi are among well-known macromycetes with various medicinal properties. The aim of this study was to investigate the biological activities of
Phellinus tuberculosus
...and
Fuscoporia ferruginosa
collected in Iran. The antimicrobial, antioxidant, and cytotoxic activities of the two species were examined, and their phenolic and polysaccharide contents were quantified. Compounds were characterized by HPLC–DAD chromatography and LC–ESI–MS/MS spectroscopy. According to our results, the antibacterial and antioxidant effects of
P. tuberculosus
extracts were stronger than
F. ferruginosa
. Also, the effect of hydroalcoholic extracts was higher than the aqueous extract. Gram-positive bacteria were more sensitive to all extracts, especially
Streptococcus mutans
with a MIC of 0.7 mg/mL and MBC of 6.25 mg/mL. HPLC–DAD analyses detected gallic acid, caffeic acid, and syringic acid in both fungi. The LC–ESI–MS/MS confirmed the detected compounds in HPLC–DAD and showed the presence of several phenolic compounds such as phellifuropyranone, phelligridin, and hispidin, besides others. This study showed that
F. ferruginosa
and
P. tuberculosus
are potent medicinal fungi with antibacterial and antioxidant properties, with no toxic effect on normal HDF cells, and possess various bioactive compounds including styrylpyrone-type phenols with well-known bioactivities.
Agaric fungi are an important group of macromycetes with diverse ecological and functional properties, yet are poorly studied in many parts of the world. Here, we comprehensively analyzed 558 agaric ...species in Iran to reveal their resources of edible and poisonous species as well as their ecological guilds and luminescence potential. We also made a thorough survey of the antioxidant activity of the species. Phylogenetic relationships were reconstructed based on nuclear ribosomal LSU and ITS sequences. Our results reveal that agarics of Iran comprise about 189 edible, 128 poisonous, 254 soil saprotrophic, 172 ectomycorrhizal, 146 wood-inhabiting, 18 leaf/litter-inhabiting, 9 parasitic, and 19 luminescent species. Twenty percent of the Iranian agaric species possess antioxidant activity, phylogenetically distributed in four orders and 21 agaric families. About 5% of the antioxidant species can be considered strong antioxidants, many of which are also edible and could be utilized to develop functional foods. This is the first study combining phylogeny and antioxidant potential of agaric mushrooms in a large scale, and the obtained results would guide the selection of agaric taxa to be examined in the future for taxonomic revisions, biotechnological applications, and applied phylogeny studies.
Chanterelles are one of the most highly valued wild edible mushroom genera worldwide. This work aimed to investigate the nutritional characteristics and volatile compounds’ profile of Cantharellus ...alborufescens for the first time. Proximate analysis was performed according to the Association of Official Agricultural Chemists, while the mineral contents and the volatile compounds were determined using ICP-MS and GC-MS, respectively. C. alborufescens had an average of 25.8% protein, 5.5% fat, 12.7% ash, and 55.9% carbohydrates, including 11.4% fiber per dw of mushroom. Further analyses of the fat and protein contents revealed high amounts of polyunsaturated fatty acids as well as monosodium glutamate-like amino acids. Linoleic acid (42.0% of fat) and oleic acid (28.6% of fat) were the major fatty acids, while leucine (1.2%) and lysine (0.9%) were the most abundant essential amino acids. The results showed that C. alborufescens contained 3.1 µg/g vitamin D2 and 4.9 mg/g vitamin E per dw, as well as notable quantities of macro- and microelements, such as potassium, calcium, magnesium, and iron. GC-MS analysis revealed various volatile compounds such as acetaldehyde, n-hexanal, 3-methylbutanal, 1-octen-3-ol, etc. In conclusion, this study supports the use of C. alborufescens as a food rich in fiber and vitamin E, with a suitable amount of protein and other nutrients.
The
Inonotus linteus
complex has been subject to thorough phylogenetic studies in the past few years, with several new species described in the complex. Species in this complex have been recently ...assigned to two new genera,
Sanghuangporus
and
Tropicoporus
. During field works made in Northwest Iran, a number of specimens belonging to the
Inonotus
(
Phellinus
)
linteus
complex were collected on
Lonicera
, and provisionally referred to as
Phellinus
cf.
baumii
. With fine data newly gathered on the delimitation of taxa in the
Inonotus linteus
complex, a re-examination of morphological characters of Iranian collections was made and analysis of ITS sequences was performed. The results show that the Iranian collections represent a new species.
Sanghuangporus ligneus
sp. nov. is closely related to
S. lonicericola
and is distinguished from it by its much larger pores, ungulate to triquetrous basidiomes, and its distribution.
Corticiaceae is one of the traditional families of the Agaricomycetes and served for a long time as a convenient placement for basidiomycetes with a resupinate, corticioid form of fruiting body. ...Molecular studies have helped to assign many corticioid fungi to diverse families and orders; however, Corticiaceae still lacks a phylogenetic characterization and modern circumscription. Here, we provide the first comprehensive phylogenetic and taxonomic revision of the family Corticiaceae based on extensive type studies and sequences of nLSU, ITS, IGS, nSSU, and mtSSU regions. Our analyses support the recognition of ten monophyletic genera in the Corticiaceae, and show that nutritional mode is not a robust basis for generic delimitations in the family. The genus
and the species
, and
are described as new to science, and five new combinations are proposed. Moreover, ancestral character state reconstruction revealed that saprotrophy is the plesiomorphic nutritional mode in the Corticiaceae, while several transitions have occurred to diverse nutritional modes in this family. Identification keys are provided to the genera in Corticiaceae s.s. as well as to the species in
, and
.
Nomenclatural type definitions are one of the most important concepts in biological nomenclature. Being physical objects that can be re-studied by other researchers, types permanently link taxonomy ...(an artificial agreement to classify biological diversity) with nomenclature (an artificial agreement to name biological diversity). Two proposals to amend the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (ICN), allowing DNA sequences alone (of any region and extent) to serve as types of taxon names for voucherless fungi (mainly putative taxa from environmental DNA sequences), have been submitted to be voted on at the 11
International Mycological Congress (Puerto Rico, July 2018). We consider various genetic processes affecting the distribution of alleles among taxa and find that alleles may not consistently and uniquely represent the species within which they are contained. Should the proposals be accepted, the meaning of nomenclatural types would change in a fundamental way from physical objects as sources of data to the data themselves. Such changes are conducive to irreproducible science, the potential typification on artefactual data, and massive creation of names with low information content, ultimately causing nomenclatural instability and unnecessary work for future researchers that would stall future explorations of fungal diversity. We conclude that the acceptance of DNA sequences alone as types of names of taxa, under the terms used in the current proposals, is unnecessary and would not solve the problem of naming putative taxa known only from DNA sequences in a scientifically defensible way. As an alternative, we highlight the use of formulas for naming putative taxa (candidate taxa) that do not require any modification of the ICN.
Anomoloma is a cosmopolitan poroid wood-decaying genus, belonging to the Amylocorticiales. During a study on polypores, two new species of Anomoloma were found in Eurasia, and they are described as ...A. denticulatum and A. eurasiaticum. To examine the phylogenetic relationships among species of Anomoloma, we analyzed nuclear ribosomal sequence data from the ITS regions and the LSU gene. The result demonstrates that A. denticulatum and A. eurasiaticum are independent species that belong to the Anomoloma genus. Both new species share the principal characteristics of the genus, but Anomoloma denticulatum is characterized by extensive white rhizomorphs spreading under the whole fruiting body, angular pores measuring 1–2 per mm, distinctly lacerate to dentate dissepiments and basidiospores of 3.5–4.3 × 2–2.5 μm. Anomoloma eurasiaticum is characterized by bearing plenty of large crystals on the mycelia and growth on Picea in high altitude areas. A key to the accepted species of Anomoloma worldwide is provided.
Fungal metabarcoding of substrates such as soil, wood, and water is uncovering an unprecedented number of fungal species that do not seem to produce tangible morphological structures and that defy ...our best attempts at cultivation, thus falling outside the scope of the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants. The present study uses the new, ninth release of the species hypotheses of the UNITE database to show that species discovery through environmental sequencing vastly outpaces traditional, Sanger sequencing-based efforts in a strongly increasing trend over the last five years. Our findings challenge the present stance of some in the mycological community - that the current situation is satisfactory and that no change is needed to "the code" - and suggest that we should be discussing not whether to allow DNA-based descriptions (typifications) of species and by extension higher ranks of fungi, but what the precise requirements for such DNA-based typifications should be. We submit a tentative list of such criteria for further discussion. The present authors hope for a revitalized and deepened discussion on DNA-based typification, because to us it seems harmful and counter-productive to intentionally deny the overwhelming majority of extant fungi a formal standing under the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants.
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