A Reappraisal of Genera in the Family Herpotrichiellaceae: Introducing Petriomyces obovoidisporus gen. et sp. nov. and Three Novel Species of Cladophialophora

Herpotrichiellaceae is a family within order Chaetothyriales (class Eurotiomycetes, phylum Ascomycota). Members of this family have been isolated from air, insects, lichens, plants, rocks, and soil worldwide. Moreover, some species can be found as opportunistic fungi in humans and other animals. Herpotrichiellaceous taxa is characterized by having setose, ostiolate ascomata, and bitunicate asci with endotunica; by appearing greenish gray to brown, and didymosporous, phragmosporous, or dictyosporous ascospores. The asexual morphs comprise dematiaceous hyphomycetes and black yeast-like. Prior to this study, Herpotrichiellaceae contains 20 validly described genera. However, the number of genera in this family has been a subject of debate due to the variability of their morphological characteristics and resulted in several taxonomic conflicts. Therefore, we performed multi-loci phylogenetic analysis for genera within this family, revealing that only 17 genera should be accepted within this family. Moreover, four novel taxa of rock-inhabiting fungi isolated from rock samples in Thailand were described based on morphological characteristics and multilocus phylogenetic analyses. Petriomyces gen. nov., has been established to accommodate the single species, Pe. obovoidisporus sp. nov. Additionally, three new species of Cladophialophora have also been identified, namely, C. rupestricola, C. sribuabanensis, and C.thailandensis.