Augustin Pyramusde Candolle was a Swiss botanist. René Louiche Desfontaines launched de Candolle's botanical career by recommending him at a herbarium. Within a couple of years de Candolle had established a new genus, and he went on to document hundreds of plant families and create a new natural plant classification system. Although de Candolle's main focus was botany, he also contributed to related fields such as phytogeography, agronomy, paleontology, medical botany, and economic botany.
Cladonia is a genus of moss-like lichens in the family Cladoniaceae. They are the primary food source for reindeer/caribou. Cladonia species are of economic importance to reindeer-herders, such as the Sami in Scandinavia or the Nenets in Russia. Antibiotic compounds are extracted from some species to create antibiotic cream. The light green species Cladonia stellaris is used in flower decorations.
Peltigera is a genus of approximately 100 species of foliose lichens in the family Peltigeraceae. Commonly known as the dog or pelt lichens, species of Peltigera are often terricolous, but can also occur on moss, trees, rocks, and many other substrates in many parts of the world.
Chrysothrix candelaris, commonly known as the mustard powder lichen or gold dust lichen, is a species of leprose (powdery) lichen in the family Chrysothricaceae. It typically grows on tree bark, although it has also been recorded growing on rock. It does not show ascocarps or other reproductive structures, belonging to the group commonly known as the 'Fungi or lichens imperfecti' in the UK.
The Pertusariaceae are a family of lichen-forming fungi in the order Pertusariales.
Physconia is a genus of lichen-forming fungi in the family Physciaceae. It has about 25 species. The genus was circumscribed by Czech lichenologist Josef Poelt in 1965, with Physconia pulverulenta assigned as the type species.
Lepraria is a genus of leprose crustose lichens that grows on its substrate like patches of granular, caked up, mealy dust grains. Members of the genus are commonly called dust lichens. The main vegetative body (thallus) is made of patches of soredia. There are no known mechanisms for sexual reproduction, yet members of the genus continue to speciate. Some species can form marginal lobes and appear squamulose. Because of the morphological simplicity of the thallus and the absence of sexual structures, the composition of lichen products are important characters to distinguish between similar species in Lepraria.
Chrysothrix is a genus of lichen-forming fungi in the family Chrysothricaceae. They are commonly called gold dust lichens or sulfur dust lichens, because they are bright yellow to greenish-yellow, sometimes flecked with orange, and composed entirely of powdery soredia. Apothecia are never present in North American specimens.
Pertusaria is a large genus of warty crustose lichens in the Pertusariaceae family. The fruiting bodies are usually modified apothecia that immersed in warts on the main body (thallus) with small holes for the spores to emerge, similar to ostioles, or are fully above and lecanorine (spore bearing discs surrounded by a ring of tissue similar to the tissue of the thallus. Members of the genus are commonly called wart lichens.
André Aptroot is a Dutch mycologist and lichenologist.
Jack Rodney Laundon was a British lichenologist and became President of the British Lichen Society.
Helge Thorsten Lumbsch is a German-born lichenologist living in the United States. His research interests include the phylogeny, taxonomy, and phylogeography of lichen-forming fungi; lichen diversity; lichen chemistry and chemotaxonomy. He is the Associate Curator and Head of Cryptogams and Chair of the Department of Botany at the Field Museum of Natural History.
Alan W. Archer is a mycologist and taxonomist. He is currently an honorary research associate at Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney. He uses chemotaxonomy as well as morphological features in taxonomy and to devise keys, most recently for the genus Pertusaria in the Australasia region.
Pyxine sorediata, commonly known as mustard lichen, is a widely distributed species of foliose lichen in the family Caliciaceae. It has a subtropical to warm temperate distribution, and grows on bark, rocks, and moss as substrates. Pyxine sorediata has been reported from regions of North America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australasia.
Pertusaria salazinica is a species of crustose lichen in the family Pertusariaceae. Found in Australia, it was described as a new species in 2017 by lichenologists Alan Archer and John Alan Elix. The type specimen was collected in Tully Gorge National Park (Queensland) at an altitude of 885 m (2,904 ft). Here, in a montane rainforest, it was found growing on a rotting log. The specific epithet refers to the presence of salazinic acid, a major secondary compound in the lichen. It also contains norstictic acid as a major metabolite, and connorstictic acid as a minor metabolite. Pertusaria salazinica is only known from the type specimen.
Lepra is a genus of lichen-forming fungi in the family Pertusariaceae. Although the genus was created in 1777, it was not regularly used until it was resurrected in 2016 following molecular phylogenetic analyses. It has more than 80 species, most of which were previously classified in genus Pertusaria.
Lichexanthone is an organic compound in the structural class of chemicals known as xanthones. Lichexanthone was first isolated and identified by Japanese chemists from a species of leafy lichen in the 1940s. The compound is known to occur in many lichens, and it is important in the taxonomy of species in several genera, such as Pertusaria and Pyxine. More than a dozen lichen species have a variation of the word lichexanthone incorporated as part of their binomial name. The presence of lichexanthone in lichens causes them to fluoresce a greenish-yellow colour under long-wavelength UV light; this feature is used to help identify some species. Lichexanthone is also found in several plants, and some species of fungi that do not form lichens.
Lepra schaereri is a species of crustose lichen in the family Pertusariaceae. It occurs in Europe. It was first described by Swiss pastor and lichenologist Ludwig Schaerer in 1821 as Spiloma isidioides. Josef Hafellner renamed it as Pertusaria schaereri in 2001, and then transferred it to Lepra after that genus was reinstated in 2016 to contain members of the Pertusaria albescens species group.
