Graphostromataceae M.E. Barr, J.D. Rogers & Y.M. Ju, Mycotaxon 48: 533 (1993)

Index Fungorum number: IF 81957; MycoBank number: MB 81957Facesoffungi number: FoF 00624; 101 species.

Saprobic on trunks, branches, and twigs of angiosperm plants, endophytic and pathogenic. Sexual morph: Stromata erumpent, widely effuse, irregular in outline, bipartite with ectostroma and entostroma, ectostroma develops first, young ectostroma surface buff, with matted mycelium, ectostroma develops beneath, hard and brittle. Ascomata perithecial, immersed in the enostroma, bottle-shaped, more rarely pyriform or obpyriform, black, opaque, monostichous, arranged in diatrypoid configuration in entostroma, compressed, varying in size with carbonaceous, doliiform ascomatal embedded necks. Peridium comprising hyaline, multi-layered, thin, indistinct, flattened cells. Paraphyses sparse, elongate, tapering from wide base. Asci 8-spored, unitunicate, narrowly clavate, short-pedicellate, rounded to subtruncate at the apex, with J+, discoid, apical ring, inconspicuously bluing in Melzer’s reagent. Ascospores uni-multiseriate, unicellular, allantoid and hyaline or brown and ellipsoid, at times with appendages, with or without germ slits, without dehiscent perispores. Stromatal pigments absent. Asexual morph: in culture nodulisporium-type, most often periconiella-like or xylocladium-like (reduced form of Periconiella) (adapted from Wendt et al. 2018).

Type genusGraphostroma Piroz.

Notes – Barr et al. (1993) introduced Graphostromataceae to accommodate Graphostroma based on species having ascospores typical of the Diatrypaceae and conidiogeneous structures typical of the Hypoxylon. Maharachchikumbura et al. (2016b) synonymized Graphostromataceae with Xylariaceae and treated Graphostroma as a genus in Xylariaceae. In recent multi-gene phylogenetic analyses reveal that Graphostromataceae is close to Barrmaeliaceae and Xylariaceae (Daranagama et al. 2018, Voglmayr et al. 2018, Wendt et al. 2018). Hongsanan et al. (2017) and Hyde et al. (2017a) provided a 63 MYA stem age for Graphostromataceae and accepted the family based on molecular clock analyses. Daranagama et al. (2015) and Senanayake et al. (2015) confirmed the monophyletic association of Biscogniauxia, Graphostroma and camillea-like genera that share common characters. Based on phylogeny and morphology, Theissenia was excluded from the family and accepted in Hypoxylaceae (Wendt et al. 2018, this study). Five accepted genera are contained in the family, Biscogniauxia, Camillea, Graphostroma, Obolarina, and Vivantia.