First Description of Akanthomyces uredinophilus comb. nov. from Hemipteran Insects in America

Filamentous fungi of the genera Lecanicillium and Akanthomyces (Ascomycota: Hypocreales: Cordycipitaceae) have been isolated from a variety of insect orders and are of particular interest as biological control agents for phloem-sucking plant pests. Three aphid- and whitefly-pathogenic fungal strains that had been isolated from naturally infected Trialeurodes vaporariorum and Myzus persicae in Argentina were assigned to the species Lecanicillium uredinophilum by combined analyses of morphology and ITS, LSU, EF1A, RPB1 and RPB2-based molecular taxonomy, giving rise to both the first description of this fungus from hemipteran insects and its first report from outside South-East Asia, especially from the American continent. A combination of phylogenetic reconstruction and analysis of pair-wise sequence similarities demonstrated that—reflecting recent changes in the systematics of Cordycipitaceae—the entire species L. uredinophilum should be transferred to the genus Akanthomyces. Consequently, the introduction of a new taxon, Akanthomaces uredinophilus comb. nov., was proposed. Moreover, extensive data mining for cryptic A. uredinophilus sequences revealed that (i) the fungus is geographically widely distributed, including earlier unrecognized isolations from further American countries such as the USA, Mexico, and Colombia, and (ii) entomopathogenic and mycoparasitic lifestyles are predominant in this species.