''Ceriporia excelsa'' is a species of

crust fungus The corticioid fungi are a group of fungi in the Basidiomycota typically having effused, smooth basidiocarps (fruit bodies) that are formed on the undersides of dead tree trunks or branches. They are sometimes colloquially called crust fungi or pa ...

in the family

Irpicaceae The Irpicaceae are a family of mostly polypores and crust fungi in the order Polyporales. Taxonomy The family was circumscribed in 2003 by mycologists Viacheslav Spirin and Ivan Zmitrovich. The type genus is '' Irpex''. Later multi-gene phylogen ...

. It is found in Europe and North America, where it typically grows on dead

hardwood Hardwood is wood from Flowering plant, angiosperm trees. These are usually found in broad-leaved temperate and tropical forests. In temperate and boreal ecosystem, boreal latitudes they are mostly deciduous, but in tropics and subtropics mostl ...

. It has also been recorded from China.

Description

The crust-like

fruit bodies The sporocarp (also known as fruiting body, fruit body or fruitbody) of fungi is a multicellular structure on which spore-producing structures, such as basidia or asci, are borne. The fruitbody is part of the sexual phase of a fungal life cyc ...

of this species are soft and readily separable from the

substrate Substrate may refer to: Physical layers *Substrate (biology), the natural environment in which an organism lives, or the surface or medium on which an organism grows or is attached ** Substrate (aquatic environment), the earthy material that exi ...

. The colour of the margin ranges from white to pinkish tan to purplish, while the pore surface is pink to reddish orange. Pores are circular or angular and number two to three per millimetre. ''C. excelsa'' has a monomitic hyphal system, with only generative

hypha A hypha (; ) is a long, branching, filamentous structure of a fungus, oomycete, or actinobacterium. In most fungi, hyphae are the main mode of vegetative growth, and are collectively called a mycelium. Structure A hypha consists of one o ...

Spores In biology, a spore is a unit of sexual (in fungi) or asexual reproduction that may be adapted for dispersal and for survival, often for extended periods of time, in unfavourable conditions. Spores form part of the life cycles of many plant ...

are oblong to somewhat cylindrical, measuring 3.5–5 by 2–2.5

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 ...

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q10657018 Fungi described in 1946 Fungi of Europe Fungi of North America Irpicaceae Fungus species