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Title: HOW SHOULD WE LOOK AT ANAMORPHS

Author
item SEIFERT, KEITH - AGIC. CANADA
item Samuels, Gary

Submitted to: Studies in Mycology
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 7/17/2000
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: Most plant pathogenic and biocontrol fungi important in agriculture reproduce as a sexual (teleomorph) and/or an asexual (anamorph) state. These reproductive structures are used for their classification, however, this is based primarily on the sexual state. For many fungal species the sexual state is not known to exist as is the case for fungi known as molds. This poses a significant problem in classifying and communicating about this very large and important group of fungi. This paper examines what is known about the evolution of asexually reproducing fungi based on molecular analyses. Suggestions are made about how to classify these fungi in a way that incorporates as much information as possible into the scientific name. These results will be useful to those who attempt to control plant diseases caused by fungi and need to communicate about those fungi.

Technical Abstract: Biological, taxonomic and nomenclatural aspects of anamorphs in the Ascomycetes are considered. Anamorphs serve dispersive or survival functions in ascomycete life cycles. Some are narrowly or broadly distributed, reproductively isolated clones, derived from sexually competent populations. Strictly asexually reproducing lineages probably occur, although cryptic sexuality has now been demonstrated for some 'anamorphic species'. Some anamorphic species are apparently hybrids between known sexually or sexually reproducing speices. Anamorphs are phenotypes that can be interpreted as organs produced as part of a fungal life cycle. Examples of morphological continua among anamorphs of closely related holomorphs argue against the sometimes arbitrary tendency to emphasize certain features as 'anamorph generic characters'. Synamorphs can be categorized as mononematous, conidionatal, mycelial, germination, survival, yeast-like, spermatial and vegetative anamorphs, which may represent expressions of different sets of genes and thus not always be homologous. Fungal taxonomy should move towards unit nomenclature, but we believe that anamorphic taxonomic names will stil be used in some form in this taxonomic system.