''Caloplaca obamae'' is a species of

crustose lichen Crustose lichens are lichens that form a crust which strongly adheres to the Substrate (biology), substrate (soil, rock, tree bark, etc.), making separation from the substrate impossible without destruction. The basic structure of crustose lichen ...

in the fungus genus '' Caloplaca''. It is the first species to be named in honor of

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

President

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...

. ''C. obamae'' was discovered in 2007 by Kerry Knudsen on Santa Rosa Island in

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

and published in March 2009. Knudsen stated that he chose to honor Obama for "his support of science and scientific education" and wrote the manuscript for publication of the species in the time between Obama's election and his inauguration.ScienceDaily. 16 April 2009
New Species Of Lichen Named After President Barack Obama
Accessed online 16 April 2009.

Description

''Caloplaca obamae'' produces a thin

thallus Thallus (: thalli), from Latinized Greek (), meaning "a green shoot" or "twig", is the vegetative tissue of some organisms in diverse groups such as algae, fungi, some liverworts, lichens, and the Myxogastria. A thallus usually names the entir ...

arranged in orange granules that are 30–50

μm The micrometre (Commonwealth English as used by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures; SI symbol: μm) or micrometer (American English), also commonly known by the non-SI term micron, is a unit of length in the International System ...

in diameter and form patches that can be 0.2–1 mm in diameter, ultimately covering an area on the soil up to 6–7 cm². The algal layer is discontinuous and usually 50–100 μm thick under the granule patches. It appears that ''C. obamae'' is sterile and does not produce

ascospore In fungi, an ascospore is the sexual spore formed inside an ascus—the sac-like cell that defines the division Ascomycota, the largest and most diverse Division (botany), division of fungi. After two parental cell nucleus, nuclei fuse, the ascu ...

s; the

apothecia An ascocarp, or ascoma (: ascomata), is the fruiting body ( sporocarp) of an ascomycete phylum fungus. It consists of very tightly interwoven hyphae and millions of embedded asci, each of which typically contains four to eight ascospores. As ...

that were present in specimens may belong to an associated species, '' Caloplaca ludificans''. ''Caloplaca obamae'' is similar in appearance to ''

Caloplaca xanthostigmoidea ''Caloplaca'' is a lichen genus comprising a number of distinct species. Members of the genus are List of common names of lichen genera, commonly called firedot lichen, jewel lichen.Field Guide to California Lichens, Stephen Sharnoff, Yale Unive ...

''.

Distribution and habitat

''Caloplaca obamae'' is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

to the northern side of Santa Rosa Island on clay soils of the

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( ; referred to colloquially as the ''ice age, Ice Age'') is the geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fin ...

marine terraces. It has not yet been discovered on mainland California,

San Miguel Island San Miguel Island ( Chumash: ''Tuqan'') is the westernmost of California's Channel Islands, located across the Santa Barbara Channel in the Pacific Ocean, within Santa Barbara County, California. San Miguel is the sixth-largest of the eight Ch ...

, or Sandy Point on Santa Rosa Island. It occurs from Bechers Bay to Soledad Canyon on Santa Rosa in grasslands that have been heavily grazed for over a hundred years. Introduced animal populations are being removed from the island and it has been suggested that ''C. obamae'', which had nearly gone extinct when cattle ranches were active, will make a comeback on the island. It is commonly found growing with other terricolous lichen species and

bryophyte Bryophytes () are a group of embryophyte, land plants (embryophytes), sometimes treated as a taxonomic Division (taxonomy), division referred to as Bryophyta ''Sensu#Common qualifiers, sensu lato'', that contains three groups of non-vascular pla ...

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q983134 obamae Lichen species Lichens of the Southwestern United States Lichens described in 2009 Fungi of California Natural history of the Channel Islands of California

Description

Distribution and habitat

See also

References