Biology

Where are all the undocumented fungal species? A study of Mortierella demonstrates the need for sequence-based classification

Document Type

Article

Abstract

ow many different kinds of fungi inhabit the earth? Hawksworth’s (2001) estimate of 1.5 million extant species is widely cited, but many other figures have been proposed, from a ‘lower limit’ of 712 000 species (Schmit & Mueller, 2007) to over 5 million species (O’Brien et al., 2005). While there is great disparity among these estimates, they all suggest that the c. 100 000 species that have been described (Kirk et al., 2008) represent just a small part of the actual diversity of fungi. It follows that most unidentifiable environmental sequences probably represent new species, which has led to proposals for sequence-based taxonomy (Hibbett et al., 2011). In this issue of New Phytologist, Nagy et al. (pp. 789–794) assess the gap between the described and sequenced dimensions of fungal diversity, focusing on the zygomycete genus Mortierella (and the related mitosporic taxa Umbelopsis, Gamsiella and Dissophora).

Publication Title

New Phytologist

Publication Date

8-2011

Volume

191

Issue

3

First Page

592

Last Page

596

ISSN

0028-646X

DOI

10.1111/j.1469-8137.2011.03819.x

Keywords

biodiversity, molecular ecology, nomenclature, taxonomy, Zygomycetes

Cross Post Location

Student Publications

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