نشریه رستنیها
سال هفدهم شماره 2 (پیاپی 52، پاییز و زمستان 1395)

The genus Ononis, embraces more than 85 species worldwide. In the present study, materials of two subspecies of O. spinosa from different localities of Iran alongside some other native species of the genus were included in phylogenetic analyses. In addition, over 50 accessions were obtained from GenBank. In order to clarify the exact number of subspecies of O. spinosa in Iran, datasets were obtained from sequencing of nuclear ribosomal ITS (nr DNA ITS) and trnL-F plastid (cp DNA) regions and analysed. Three taxa belonging to O. spinosa L. complex (O. spinosa subsp. leiosperma, O. spinosa subsp. antiquorum, and O. arvensis=O. spinosa subsp. arvensis) were previously reported from Iran. Based on Maximum Parsimony and Bayesian analyses of the molecular datasets, it is shown that, unlike the previous reports, Iranian O. spinosa complex belongs to only two subspecies (i.e. leiosperma and arvensis subspp.). In addition, we also found that, O. spinosa subsp. antiquorum is not present in Iran. It was also demonstrated that, seed sculpturing does not provide valuable characters in diagnosing different subspecies of O. spinosa.

The genus Silene, with more than 100 species in Iran is an important genus of Iranian flora. According to available data on the northwestern parts of Iran, including three provinces of Ardabil, East and West Azarbaijan are considered as a major diversity center of perennial species of the genus Silene in Iran. In the course of a revision of Silene in this area, some interesting specimens were collected which are new records from Iran. In this paper, occurrence of Silene dianthoides (sect. Caespitosae), and S. chustupica (sect. Auriculatae) are reported. The name S. dianthoides is used for previous records of S. marcowiczii which is more likely conspecific. Both species are growing in alpine zone. The previously evaluated threatened status of S. chustupica as critically endangered according to IUCN red list categories is discussed here. The taxonomical descriptions, geographical distribution and the ecology of the new records are provided and their photographs are also presented.

In a study on coprophilous fungi, different samples including cow, sheep and horse dung and mouse feces were collected from different locations in West and East Azarbaijan provinces (NW Iran). Isolation of the fungi was done based on moist chamber culture method. Purification of the isolated fungi was done by single spore culture method. Several fungal taxa were obtained. Identification of the isolates at species level was done based on morphological characteristics and data obtained from internal transcribed spacer (ITS) regions of ribosomal DNA sequences. In this paper, five taxa viz. Arthrobotrys conoides, Botryosporium longibrachiatum, Cephaliophora irregularis, Oedocephalum glomerulosum, and Podospora pauciseta, all of them belong to Ascomycota, are reported and described. All these taxa are new records for Iran mycobiota.

In a survey on the biodiversity of Penicillium species in soils of the National Park of Urmia Lake (NW Iran), eight Penicillium isolates were isolated as members of the section Citrina. Based on a combination of cultural and morphological criteria, the isolates were identified as Penicillium anatolicum, P. sanguifluum, and P. sizovae. The identity of each species was further confirmed using sequence data of β-tubulin gene (BenA). Three species are reported and described here as new records for the mycobita of Iran.

The increasing rate of irreversible damages to natural habitats has reinforced the need for gathering biodiversity fundamental data to conservation. Priority setting is the most important step in protection programs. Solanaceae as the the one of important economic families of eudicots distributed throughout North and South America, Europe, Africa, Asia, Australia, and the South Pacific. Up to now, little attention has been paid to the patterns and diversity centers of Solanaceae in Iran. The present study describes in as much detail as possible the spatial distribution, areas with greater species richness, and centers of diversity for taxa. An ecogeographical database was developed using the records that corresponds to 3123 herbarium specimens belong to 2560 localities. The localities were marked using ArcView version 3.2 (ESRI 2000) on geo-referenced maps (1/106) of Iran. The distribution patterns of the taxa were mapped per 1° × 1° universal transverse Mercator grid cells (100 km2 with the exception of boundary area). Threatened categories of Iranian Solanaceae, including CR (43.4%) and VU (34%), mainly (58.9%) distributed in Irano-Turanian phytochorion. Solanaceae represents the highest richness in the central Alborz, Zagros, Kopet Dagh and Makran Mountains based on recent criteria. The conservation value of habitats of Solanaceae in Iran ranges from 0.15 (in coastline of Persian Gulf) to 11.19 (in eastern Alborz).

The present research aimed to investigate through a polyphasic approach, the differences in morphological and genotypic features of two cyanobacterial strains isolated from paddy fields of northern parts of Iran, belonging to the family Nostocaceae (subsect. IV. I). Based on the reliable identification keys, the two strains were identified as Nostoc ellipsosporum (Desm.) Rabenh. ex Born. et Flah, and N. muscorum Ag. ex Born. et Flah. Sequencing of cloned bacterial 16S rRNA fragment strongly indicated that, two Nostoc strains could not be discriminated by 16S rRNA and ITS genes sequencing and the current morphological classification of both is invalid. Moreover, phylogenetic study of two Nostoc strains has demonstrated that, genetic relationships are in conflict with the morphological classification. Besides, after doing DNA-DNA reassociation experiments, it was concluded that, two Nostoc strains investigated might possibly be united into one species. Finally, two Nostoc species were named as Nostoc sp. Bahar_E and Nostoc sp. Bahar_M, and have been registered under DDBJ, accession numbers: JF795278 and JF272482, respectively.

In order to determine the causal agents of Fusarium head blight, during 2015–16, wheat heads with disease symptom were collected from 10 and six main wheat production areas of Golestan and Mazandaran provinces (N Iran), respectively. A total of 431 Fusarium isolates were obtained belonging to nine Fusarium species based on their morphological characteristics. Fusarium graminearum species complex had the highest frequency among the species in both provinces, Golestan (52.0%) and Mazandaran (55.8%). Fusarium culmorum, F. equiseti, F. Acuminatum, and F. compactum had the highest mean of frequency in both provinces with 13.5, 9.7, 6.0 and 3.7%, respectively after F. graminearum. Also, F. cerealis, F. Avenaceum, and F. proliferatum and some unidentified isolates a total of 14% of the isolates were calculated. The lowest frequency was related to F. subglutinans (1%) that was isolated only from Golestan province. In order to determine the phylogeny of F. graminearum species complex in the North Iran, 53 out of 229 isolates were selected based on their distribution in the sampled areas. Partial genes of translation elongation factor 1-alpha (TEF) and putative reductase (RED) were amplified using specific primers. A commercial sequencing facility was used to generate fungal sequences. Almost all strains of F. graminearum species complex belonged to F. graminearum sensu stricto. The results indicated a homogeniety within F. graminearum species complex, however, there was a minor morphologically differences between some strains.

Medicinal mushroom Ganoderma lucidum has been used in East Asia for centuries in order to prevent and treat a variety of diseases such as hepatitis, immunological disorders and cancers. In fact, this fungus contains a vast source of polysaccharides, proteins and secondary metabolites with anti-tumor and immuno-modulatory properties. Up to now, a variety of drug metabolites extracted from G. lucidum have reached the stage of commercial production. Recently, in addition to China, Korea and Japan, this valuable fungus has been identified in different parts of the world such as Pakistan, Malaysia and Turkey. In 2007, G. lucidum has been identified in northern forests of Iran; however, molecular identification of this fungus has not been reported yet. The aim of this study was, therefore, to identify this fungus collected from northern Iran by analyzing ITS-5.8S rDNA sequence. The result of this experiment confirmed that the collected specimen were G. lucidum.

Rhizopogon is a hypogeous fungal genus that grows in an ectomycorrhizal symbiosis mostly with members of the Pinaceae family and its worldwide distribution correlates with natural and exotic Pinaceae forests. In Iran, Rhizopogon species have received scant attention from collectors in the past and have not been adequately collected. Few older studies, report the presence of R. luteolus (Saber 1999), and R. vulgaris in Iran (Ershad 2009). However, the accuracy of the species identification merely on the basis of morphological features is questionable. Rhizopogon roseolus is common in northwestern United States USA (Coker & Couch 1928, Harrison & Smith 1968). So far, it has been reported from, Finland (Schulmann 1955), Chile (Garrido 1986), Brazil (Baseia & Milanez 2002), Poland (Iwanski et al. 2006), Spain (Dominguez-Nunez et al. 2013) and New Zealand. In this study, seven specimens associated with roots of Pinus eldarica based on morphological and molecular characteristics were examined. Basidiocarps were hypogeous, globose, subglobose or irregular with different sizes (up to 10 cm in diam.) (Fig. 1A). Peridium was smooth and orange. Gleba was white to olive (Fig. 1B). Fresh mature basidiocarp not reacting in iodine. The basidia were club-shaped and 15–20 × 6–8 μm (Fig. 1C). Columella absent and paraphyses about 12–18 × 5–9 μm (Fig. 1D).
The basidiospores ellipsoidal, smooth, hyaline, 6–8 × 3–4 μm, often contain two guttulae inside and falsely septate (Fig. 1E). All DNA sequences of Rhizopogon (accession numbers: KP202698 to KP202700) showed 100% homology with valid sequences previously identified and deposited in GenBank. Phylogenetic trees constructed based on ITS sequences showed that, all Iranian specimens are in the same branch in a clade with R. roseolus reported from other authors (Fig. 2). Rhizopogon roseolus, R. Burlinghamii, and R. vulgaris form distinct clades which were well-supported by bootstrap value (78% MP). This is the first report of R. roseolus and its host plant from Iran.
Voucher specimens are deposited in the Culture Collection of the Ministry of Jihad-e-Agriculture (“IRAN”) located at the Iranian Research Institute of Plant Protection, Tehran, Iran (IRAN-16730F).

By studying algae reports from different localities of the country during the past 87 years, about 6000 records information including 2567 species and infra-specifics were analyzed and distribution maps were drawn. The algae studies in the Iranian islands of the Persian Gulf, especially around Bushehr and the Khark Island by Borgesen (1930), the oldest available document is used in this study. Many of the scientific names of the references used were synonyms with authorities in the field of algae taxonomy, such as AlgaeBase (Guiry & Guiry 2015) were changed to valid names.
Using the capabilities VB.Net programming (Foxall 2015) under a model of software named as “Explorer for Algae of Iran” was designed and developed. The main targets of this study and making utilities and technical options related to the three essential questions are as follows:1. How can plot distribution maps for selected algae species?
2. How can view the geographic coordinates of the points in DMS by moving the cursor on the map and related list of species and documented information for selected area?
3. How can the taxa levels such as genus, species, subspecies, varieties, and forms in search mode could be computed simultaneously?
This software package designed to provide all these cases where its general view is shown in Fig. 1. In addition, a list references and a search engine are provided in this algorithm. To show more data, a special version of software for information represented by the letters A to C of those scientific names (about 687 taxa) is provided which can be downloaded via: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bx_0u3VbcpmOMjBoM19nbmpnUFU/view?usp=sharing On the other hand, exploring and numerical analysis of taxa on the map is also very important. For example, processing of exploring Qeshm Island which is shown in Fig. 2. It seems that, such user friendly digital structure has an effective role for biodiversity studies of algae. Moreover, giving the importance of localization of technical knowledge to investigate the diversity and distribution of these algorithms can also benefit other living organisms in Iran.