Byssosphaeria clematidis L. L. Liu & Z. Y. Liu 2025, comb. nov.

Byssosphaeria clematidis (Wanas., Phukhams., E. B. G. Jones & K. D. Hyde) L. L. Liu & Z. Y. Liu comb. nov. Basionym. Neobyssosphaeria clematidis Wanas, Phukhams., E. B. G. Jones, & K. D. Hyde, Fungal Diversity 102: 57 (2020). Material examined. UK • Hampshire, Botleywood, on dead stems of Clematis vitalba, 25 May, 2016, E. B. G. Jones, GJ 298 (MFLU 17-0614, holotype); • ex-type living culture, MFLUCC 17-0794. Description. Phukhamsakda et al. (2020). GenBank accession numbers. LSU: MT 214566; SSU: MT 408594. Taxonomic notes. Phukhamsakda et al. (2020) introduced Neobyssosphaeria, which was grouped with Byssosphaeria to form a basal lineage in their phylogenetic analyses of combined LSU, SSU, and ITS sequence data. Morphologically, Phukhamsakda et al. (2020) distinguished Neobyssosphaeria from Byssosphaeria by immersed ascomata with central papilla filled with periphyses, cellular pseudoparaphyses, and broad fusiform and hyaline ascospores. However, these characters also exist in some Byssosphaeria species. For example, B. siamensis has ascomata with cellular pseudoparaphyses (Tian et al. 2015), and other species, such as B. salebrosa and B. villosa, have broad, fusiform, and hyaline ascospores (Samuels and Müller 1978; Barr 1984), being reminiscent of Neobyssosphaeria clematidis (Phukhamsakda et al. 2020). The only distinctive features are immersed ascomata in Neobyssosphaeria and superficial ascomata in Byssosphaeria. We regard it as not sufficient for the separation of these two genera (Sandoval-Denis et al. 2016; Sun et al. 2023). Additionally, in our phylogenetic analyses, Neobyssosphaeria clematidis formed an internal clade within Byssosphaeria. Therefore, we transfer Neobyssosphaeria clematidis to Byssosphaeria as B. clematidis and treat Neobyssosphaeria as a synonym of Byssosphaeria.