A taxonomic re-assessment of Colletotrichum acutatum, introducing C. fioriniae comb. et s.pdfVIP

Online advance Fungal Diversity 111 A taxonomic re-assessment of Colletotrichum acutatum, introducing C. fioriniae comb. et stat. nov. and C. simmondsii sp. nov. Shivas, R.G.* and Tan, Y.P. Plant Pathology Herbarium, Queensland Primary Industries and Fisheries, 80 Meiers Road, Indooroopilly, Queensland 4068, Australia. Shivas, R.G. and Tan, Y.P. (2009). A taxonomic re-assessment of Colletotrichum acutatum, introducing C. fioriniae comb. et stat. nov. and C. simmondsii sp. nov. Fungal Diversity 39: 111-122. A comparative morphological and molecular analysis of the ITS and β-tubulin regions of 48 Australian isolates identified as Colletotrichum acutatum, with published descriptions and DNA sequence data from Australia and overseas, revealed three distinct groups. One group contained the holotype and two paratypes of C. acutatum, whereas a recently designated epitype was found to be non-conspecific with the holotype. Two new species, C. fioriniae comb. et stat. nov. and C. simmondsii sp. nov., are described and illustrated with the latter having as holotype the non-conspecific epitype of C. acutatum. These three taxa corresponded with phylogenetic groupings of C. acutatum previously reported by other authors. Key words: Colletotrichum, phylogeny, taxonomy, β-tubulin, ITS Article Information Received 11 November 2009 Accepted 22 November 2009 Published online 9 Decemebr 2009 *Corresponding author: Roger G. Shivas; e-mail: roger.shivas@deedi.qld.gov.au Introduction Colletotrichum acutatum J.H. Simmonds ex J.H. Simmonds is a major pathogen with a worldwide distribution causing diseases com- monly known as anthracnose on a wide range of plants, including legumes, vegetables, small fruits and perennial tree crops, in more than 40 plant families (Walker et al., 1991; Johnston and Jones, 1997; Sreenivasaprasad and Talhin- has, 2005; Hyde et al., 2009). Colletotrichum acutatum was first described from Australia (Simmond