Malmideaceae is a

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

crustose Crustose is a Habit (biology), habit of some types of algae and lichens in which the organism grows tightly appressed to a substrate, forming a biological layer. ''Crustose'' adheres very closely to the Substrate (biology), substrates at all poin ...

and corticolous lichens in the order Lecanorales. It contains eight genera and about 70 species.

Taxonomy

Malmideaceae was created in 2011 to accommodate a group of species, formerly placed in genus '' Malcolmiella'' (family Pilocarpaceae), that

molecular phylogenetic Molecular phylogenetics () is the branch of phylogeny that analyzes genetic, hereditary molecular differences, predominantly in DNA sequences, to gain information on an organism's evolutionary relationships. From these analyses, it is possible to ...

s showed to be a distinct lineage and worthy of recognition at the family level. The genus ''Savoronala'', containing the single African species '' S. madagascariensis'', was added to the family in 2013, while another

monotypic In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unisp ...

genus '' Kalbionora'' was added in 2017.

Description

Malmideaceae is similar to Pilocarpaceae, but can be distinguished from that family by

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 ...

organization and

ascus An ascus (; : asci) is the sexual spore-bearing cell produced in ascomycete fungi. Each ascus usually contains eight ascospores (or octad), produced by meiosis followed, in most species, by a mitotic cell division. However, asci in some gen ...

structure. ''Malmidea'' species have a thallus made of goniocysts–spherical aggregations of

photobiont A lichen ( , ) is a hybrid colony of algae or cyanobacteria living symbiotically among filaments of multiple fungus species, along with yeasts and bacteria embedded in the cortex or "skin", in a mutualistic relationship.

cells surrounded by short-celled

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 ...

e. This characteristic is quite rare in the Pilocarpaceae, only found in the

genera '' Calopadiopsis'' and '' Pseudocalopadia''. Despite the general overall similarity of the ascus structure between the two families, unlike the Pilocarpaceae, Malmideaceae species lack a tubular structure in their asci. Most ''Malmidea'' species are restricted to

subtropical The subtropical zones or subtropics are geographical zone, geographical and Köppen climate classification, climate zones immediately to the Northern Hemisphere, north and Southern Hemisphere, south of the tropics. Geographically part of the Ge ...

areas. The genus '' Zhurbenkoa'', consisting of three lichenicolous fungi from South America and Europe, represented the addition of a new nutritional mode for the Malmideaceae, which until then had consisted of only lichen-forming associations between fungi and

green algae The green algae (: green alga) are a group of chlorophyll-containing autotrophic eukaryotes consisting of the phylum Prasinodermophyta and its unnamed sister group that contains the Chlorophyta and Charophyta/ Streptophyta. The land plants ...

Genera

*'' Australidea'' – 1 sp. *'' Cheiromycina'' – 4 spp. *'' Crustospathula'' – 4 spp. *'' Kalbionora'' – 1 sp. *'' Malmidea'' – 52 spp. *'' Multisporidea'' – 1 sp. *'' Savoronala'' – 1 sp. *''

Sprucidea ''Sprucidea'' is a genus of four crustose lichens in the family Malmideaceae. Similar to the related genus ''Malmidea'', ''Sprucidea '' is characterized by frequently red thallus, thalli that contain the secondary metabolite, secondary compound n ...

'' – 4 spp. *'' Zhurbenkoa'' – 3 spp. ''Crustospathula'' was transferred to the Malmideaceae from the Ramalinaceae in 2018.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q17389021 * Lichen families Lecanoromycetes families Taxa named by Helge Thorsten Lumbsch Taxa named by Klaus Kalb Taxa described in 2011