Four new families of Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi within the order glomerales

Abstract

Based on molecular phylogenetic analyses, and also considering morphological characters, four new families are separated from the family Glomeraceae within the order Glomerales and the class Glomeromycetes. The revised family Glomeraceae comprises only four genera: the type genus Glomus , Complexispora , Sclerocarpum and Simiglomus . Septoglomeraceae fam. nov. comprises, besides Septoglomus , Funneliformis , Funneliglomus , Blaszkowskia and Viscospora . Sclerocystaceae fam. nov. is represented by the type genus Sclerocystis but also by Halonatospora , Oehlia , Parvocarpum , Rhizoglomus and Silvaspora . Kamienskiaceae fam. nov. encompasses Kamienskia , Microkamienskia and Epigeocarpum . Finally, Dominikiaceae fam. nov. includes the genera Dominikia , Macrodominikia gen. nov., Microdominikia , Nanoglomus and Orientoglomus . The genera Oehlia and Halonatospora form two other clades well separated from Silvaspora , Sclerocystis and Rhizoglomus and might represent two further families within Glomerales. This deeper separation is, in our opinion, fully supported by molecular phylogeny, but in view of the low numbers of taxa, the separation is not yet proposed at this stage of research progress.