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ARS Home » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #108438
Title: TRICHODERMA AUREOVIRIDE:PHYLOGENETIC POSITION AND CHARACTERIZATION

Author
item LIECKFELDT, ELKE - GERMANY
item KULLNIG, CORNELIA - AUSTRIA
item KUBICEK, CHRISTIAN - AUSTRIA
item Samuels, Gary
item BORNER, THOMAS - GERMANY

Submitted to: Mycological Research
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 8/5/2000
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary: The development of management strategies to control fungal diseases through the use of biological control agents is hindered by lack of knowledge about species in the genus Trichoderma and its sexual state, Hypocrea. One species often used in biological control is Trichoderma aureoviride. This study presents morphological and molecular evidence that Trichoderma aureoviride and its sexual state, Hypocrea aureoviride, is limited to northern Europe. This species is described and illustrated. Many isolates of Trichoderma have been misidentified as T. aureoviride and are correctly placed in this publication. These results will be useful to agricultural scientists who need to accurately identify these fungi as well as to scientists working on the development of novel agents for the biological control of disease-causing fungi.

Technical Abstract: Aspects of identification and phylogenetic placement of Trichoderma aureoviride/Hypocrea aureoviridis are examined. The identity of strains reported in the literature and/or deposited in culture collections as T. aureoviride/H. aureoviridis was reexamined. Comparisons of morphological and molecular characters of the ex-type culture of T. aureoviridis with cultures derived from subsequent collections of H. aureoviride confirm that T. aureoviride is the anamorph of H. aureoviridis. Most of the strains that had been identified as T. aureoviride are more typical of T. harzianum, a member of sect. Pachybasium. Molecular data indicate that T. aureoviride has probably developed early in the evolution of the genus and survived until today only in a few niches. On a basis of our results, we redefine T. aureoviride, limiting it to Trichoderma strains with very slow growth rate, effuse conidiation, and the ITS-1 and 2 sequence type D.