Botryosphaerialean fungi associated with woody oil plants cultivated in Sichuan Province, China

Abstract

Woody oil plants are important economic trees which are widely cultivated and distributed throughout China. Surveys conducted during 2020 and 2021 on several woody oil plantations from five regions of Sichuan Province, China, revealed a high diversity of Botryosphaerialean fungi. The identification of 50 botryosphaeriaceous isolates was carried out based on both morphology and multi-gene phylogenetic analysis of internal transcribed spacer region (ITS), translation elongation factor 1-alpha gene (tef1) and β-tubulin gene (tub2). This allowed the identification of twelve previously known Botryosphaeriales species: Aplosporella prunicola, A. ginkgonis, Barriopsis tectonae, Botryosphaeria dothidea, Bo. fabicerciana, Diplodia mutila, Di. seriata, Dothiorella sarmentorum, Neofusicoccum parvum, Sardiniella guizhouensis, Sphaeropsis citrigena, and Sp. guizhouensis, and four novel species belonging to the genera Diplodia and Dothiorella, viz. Di. acerigena, Di. pistaciicola, Do. camelliae and Do. zanthoxyli. The dominant species isolated across the surveyed regions were Botryosphaeria dothidea, Sardiniella guizhouensis and Diplodia mutila, representing 20%, 14% and 12% of the total isolates, respectively. In addition, most isolates were obtained from Pistacia chinensis (14 isolates), followed by Camellia oleifera (10 isolates). The present study enhances the understanding of Botryosphaeriales species diversity on woody oil plants in Sichuan Province, China.