Combresomyces Temporal range: | |
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Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Clade: | Diaphoretickes |
Clade: | SAR |
Clade: | Stramenopiles |
Phylum: | Gyrista |
Class: | Oomycetes |
Order: | incertae sedis |
Genus: | † Combresomyces Dotzler, M. Krings, Agerer, Galtier & T.N. Taylor, 2008 |
Species | |
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Combresomyces is a genus of hyphal, parasitic oomycete known from the fossil record; it infects organisms such as the seed fern Lyginopteris . [1]
The Oomycetes, or Oomycota, form a distinct phylogenetic lineage of fungus-like eukaryotic microorganisms within the Stramenopiles. They are filamentous and heterotrophic, and can reproduce both sexually and asexually. Sexual reproduction of an oospore is the result of contact between hyphae of male antheridia and female oogonia; these spores can overwinter and are known as resting spores. Asexual reproduction involves the formation of chlamydospores and sporangia, producing motile zoospores. Oomycetes occupy both saprophytic and pathogenic lifestyles, and include some of the most notorious pathogens of plants, causing devastating diseases such as late blight of potato and sudden oak death. One oomycete, the mycoparasite Pythium oligandrum, is used for biocontrol, attacking plant pathogenic fungi. The oomycetes are also often referred to as water molds, although the water-preferring nature which led to that name is not true of most species, which are terrestrial pathogens.
Pteridospermatophyta, also called "pteridosperms" or "seed ferns" are a polyphyletic grouping of extinct seed-producing plants. The earliest fossil evidence for plants of this type are the lyginopterids of late Devonian age. They flourished particularly during the Carboniferous and Permian periods. Pteridosperms declined during the Mesozoic Era and had mostly disappeared by the end of the Cretaceous Period, though Komlopteris seem to have survived into Eocene times, based on fossil finds in Tasmania.
A parasitic plant is a plant that derives some or all of its nutritional requirements from another living plant. They make up about 1% of angiosperms and are found in almost every biome. All parasitic plants develop a specialized organ called the haustorium, which penetrates the host plant, connecting them to the host vasculature – either the xylem, phloem, or both. For example, plants like Striga or Rhinanthus connect only to the xylem, via xylem bridges (xylem-feeding). Alternately, plants like Cuscuta and some members of Orobanche connect to both the xylem and phloem of the host. This provides them with the ability to extract resources from the host. These resources can include water, nitrogen, carbon and/or sugars. Parasitic plants are classified depending on the location where the parasitic plant latches onto the host, the amount of nutrients it requires, and their photosynthetic capability. Some parasitic plants can locate their host plants by detecting volatile chemicals in the air or soil given off by host shoots or roots, respectively. About 4,500 species of parasitic plants in approximately 20 families of flowering plants are known.
Albugo candida, commonly known as white rust or white blister rust, is an obligate plant pathogen in the family Albuginaceae that infects Brassicaceae species. It has a relatively smaller genome than other oomycetes.
Phytophthora citrophthora, also known as brown rot of citrus, is a soil borne oomycete that infects several economically important citrus crops. A diagnostic symptom of P. citrophthora is gummosis, wherein lesions around the base of the tree exude sap. Other common symptoms include dark longitudinal lesions forming at the soil line, a sour smell, and eventual cracking of the bark. Advanced symptoms include yellowing and necrosis of the tree canopy. Girdling action caused by the pathogen around the trunk can often cause the collapse of the tree. Resistant lemon varieties have been developed and their implementation has been effective at controlling the spread of the disease. Fruits that have been infected with P. citrophthora exhibit symptoms of brown rot characterized by a distinct odor. This disease is most active in the moderate temperatures of spring, fall, and winter months, opposite of most other Phytophthora species.
Pythium irregulare is a soil borne oomycete plant pathogen. Oomycetes, also known as "water molds", are fungal-like protists. They are fungal-like because of their similar life cycles, but differ in that the resting stage is diploid, they have coenocytic hyphae, a larger genome, cellulose in their cell walls instead of chitin, and contain zoospores and oospores.
Pythium ultimum is a plant pathogen. It causes damping off and root rot diseases of hundreds of diverse plant hosts including corn, soybean, potato, wheat, fir, and many ornamental species. P. ultimum belongs to the peronosporalean lineage of oomycetes, along with other important plant pathogens such as Phytophthora spp. and many genera of downy mildews. P. ultimum is a frequent inhabitant of fields, freshwater ponds, and decomposing vegetation in most areas of the world. Contributing to the widespread distribution and persistence of P. ultimum is its ability to grow saprotrophically in soil and plant residue. This trait is also exhibited by most Pythium spp. but not by the related Phytophthora spp., which can only colonize living plant hosts.
Pythium aphanidermatum is a soil borne plant pathogen. Pythium is a genus in the class Oomycetes, which are also known as water molds. Oomycetes are not true fungi, as their cell walls are made of cellulose instead of chitin, they are diploid in their vegetative state, and they form coenocytic hyphae. Also, they reproduce asexually with motile biflagelette zoospores that require water to move towards and infect a host. Sexually, they reproduce with structures called antheridia, oogonia, and oospores.
Plasmopara halstedii is a plant pathogen infecting sunflowers. The species is one of many pathogens commonly referred to as downy mildew. P. halstedii originated in North America.
Plasmopara obducens is a species of oomycete that causes Impatiens downy mildew. It was first described on Impatiens noli-tangere in Germany in 1877. Plasmopara obducens is known from native species of Impatiens since the 1800s, but outbreaks on cultivated varieties of Impatiens walleriana started in 2003 in the United Kingdom and in 2004 in the United States. The outbreak spread worldwide by 2016.
Adiantum jordanii is a perennial species of maidenhair fern, in the Vittarioideae subfamily of the Pteridaceae. The species is known by the common name California maidenhair.
Arceuthobium americanum is a species of dwarf mistletoe known as American dwarf mistletoe and lodgepole-pine dwarf mistletoe. It is a common plant of western North America where it lives in high elevation pine forests. It is a parasitic plant which lives upon the Lodgepole Pine, particularly the subspecies Pinus contortus ssp. murrayana, the Tamarack Pine. This pine subspecies is most common in the Cascade Range and Sierra Nevada. The American dwarf mistletoe is a yellow-green coral-shaped structure above the surface of the tree's bark, while most of the parasite is beneath the bark. The seeds mature in late summer and disperse to nearby trees. This species has been found to explosively-disperse its seeds through thermogenesis.
Peronospora hyoscyami f.sp. tabacina is a plant pathogen infecting tobacco that causes blue mold. It is an oomycete that is highly destructive toward seed plants. It is very prevalent in humid farming zones, like the southeastern and Eastern U.S., Canada, and countries bordering the Caribbean. The disease was first identified in 1921 in Florida and Georgia. Ten years later the same disease was found once again in the same region of the U.S. The disease began to spread into Virginia, Maryland, and North Carolina. A few years later, the disease reached Kentucky and Tennessee. In 1960, a blue mold epidemic spread in approximately eleven countries. There was approximately twenty five million dollars in losses which is nearly thirty percent of tobacco plants at the time. Each year, Peronospora hyoscyami is introduced as blue mold as windblown spores from outside the region by infected transplants.
Endornaviridae is a family of viruses. Plants, fungi, and oomycetes serve as natural hosts. There are 31 species in this family, assigned to 2 genera. Members of Alphaendornavirus infect plants, fungi and the oomycete Phytophthora sp., members of Betaendornavirus infect ascomycete fungi.
Lyginopteris is a genus of Late Carboniferous seed fern stems with a very distinctive outer cortex of sclereids forming a pattern in cross section like Roman numerals on a clock face, often called a Sparganum cortex. Some Lyginopteris were parasitized by water molds, such as the Combresomyces.
Miracula is a genus of parasitic protists that parasite diatoms, containing the type species Miracula helgolandica. More recently, the species Miracula moenusica from the river Main in Frankfurt am Main, Miracula islandica from a shore in the north of Iceland, Miracula einbuarlaekurica from a streamlet in the north of Iceland, and Miracula blauvikensis from the shore at the research station Blávík in the east fjords of Iceland were added to the genus. It is the only genus in the family Miraculaceae, of uncertain taxonomic position within the Oomycetes. They're one of the most basal lineages in the phylogeny of Oomycetes.
Commonly known as Philippine downy mildew, this disease is caused by the species Peronosclerospora philippinensis of the fungal-like protist class Oomycetes, which also has members such as water molds and Phytophthora infestans, which caused the potato blight that led to the Great Irish famine.
Collar rot is a symptomatically described disease that is usually caused by any one of various fungal and oomycete plant pathogens. It is present where the pathogen causes a lesion localized at or about the collet between the stem and the root. The lesions develop around the stem eventually forming a "collar". Observationally, collar rot grades into "basal stem rot", and with some pathogens is the first phase of "basal stem rot" often followed by "root rot". Collar rot is most often observed in seedings grown in infected soil. The pathogens that cause collar rot may be species or genera specific. But generalist pathogens such as Agroathelia rolfsii are known to attack over 200 different species. While bacteria caused collar rot is not common, trees infected with Fire blight may develop collar rot. Non-parasitic collar rot may be caused by winter damage.
Lagenostoma is a genus of seed ferns (Pteridospermatophyta), based on ovules preserved in coal balls from the Six Inch Coal of the Hough Hill Colliery near Stalybridge, England. Distinctive stalked glands enabled Oliver and Scott to attribute these seeds to fernlike foliage of Sphenopteris hoeningshauseni in the same coal balls. This was the first recognition that some Carboniferous fernlike leaves had seeds, and so were not pteridophytes, but rather Pteridospermatophyta, or seed ferns. The realization that seed plants as well as spore plants had fernlike leaves was a major contribution to the evolutionary history of plants.
Crossotheca is an extinct genus of seed ferns (Pteridospermatophyta) widespread in coal measures of Carboniferous, Permian and Triassic age, with possible Devonian remains known from Belgium. The type species is C. crepini, named and described in 1883 by R. Zeiller, and the genus is known from fossils found in Belgium (?), Canada, China, England, France, Hungary, Ireland, Poland and the United States.