Cytospora Ehrenb.
Index Fungorum number: IF 7904; MycoBank number: MB 7904; FacesofFungi number: FoF01378
The genus, Cytospora, was erected by Ehrenberg (1818) and belongs to Cytosporaceae within Diaporthales (Wijayawardene et al. 2017). Cytospora, established as an asexual name, predates all the sexual synonyms such as Valsa, Leucocytospora, Leucostoma, Valsella, and Valseutypella, making it the primary name in nomenclature (Adams et al. 2004, Fan et al. 2015 a, b, Zhang et al. 2019). Cytospora species are plant pathogens, endophytes, or saprobes. They are found globally and are responsible for canker and dieback diseases on various plant species (Norphanphoun et al. 2018, Monkai et al. 2021b). In the past, identifying species within Cytospora was challenging because of similar morphological characters and diverse host ranges. A comprehensive method, incorporating host association, geographic distribution, morphological features, and multigene phylogeny, is now commonly used to distinguish Cytospora species (Monkai et al. 2021b). Cytospora is distinguished by its coelomycetous asexual morphology. The sexual form of Cytospora features solitary ascostromata that are immersed to erumpent, consisting of prosenchymatous or pseudoparenchymatous cells with valsoid or diatrypelloid configurations, enclosed in an ectostromatic disc; ellipsoid to clavate, J- apical ring asci; and hyaline, ellipsoid to allantoid, aseptate ascospores (Monkai et al. 2021b). Cytospora can be distinguished from other diaporthalean genera by its elongated, hyaline conidia and ascospores (Wang et al. 2024b). The classification of Cytospora now relies more on a combination of DNA sequence data, morphology, and ecological characteristics rather than solely on species morphology and host associations (Wang et al. 2024b).
Species