Unambiguous Identification of Fungi: Where Do We Stand and How Accurate and Precise Is Fungal DNA Barcoding? Robert Lücking1,2* , M
Lücking et al. IMA Fungus (2020) 11:14 https://doi.org/10.1186/s43008-020-00033-z IMA Fungus NOMENCLATURE Open Access Unambiguous identification of fungi: where do we stand and how accurate and precise is fungal DNA barcoding? Robert Lücking1,2* , M. Catherine Aime2,3 , Barbara Robbertse4, Andrew N. Miller2,5 , Hiran A. Ariyawansa2,6 , Takayuki Aoki2,7 , Gianluigi Cardinali8 , Pedro W. Crous2,9,10 , Irina S. Druzhinina2,11,12 , David M. Geiser13, David L. Hawksworth2,14,15,16,17 ,KevinD.Hyde2,18,19,20,21 , Laszlo Irinyi22 , Rajesh Jeewon23 , Peter R. Johnston2,24 , Paul M. Kirk25 , Elaine Malosso2,26 ,TomW.May2,27 , Wieland Meyer22 ,MaarjaÖpik2,28 ,VincentRobert8,9, Marc Stadler2,29 ,MarcoThines2,30 , Duong Vu9 ,AndreyM.Yurkov2,31 ,NingZhang2,32 and Conrad L. Schoch2,4 ABSTRACT True fungi (Fungi) and fungus-like organisms (e.g. Mycetozoa, Oomycota) constitute the second largest group of organisms based on global richness estimates, with around 3 million predicted species. Compared to plants and animals, fungi have simple body plans with often morphologically and ecologically obscure structures. This poses challenges for accurate and precise identifications. Here we provide a conceptual framework for the identification of fungi, encouraging the approach of integrative (polyphasic) taxonomy for species delimitation, i.e. the combination of genealogy (phylogeny), phenotype (including autecology), and reproductive biology (when feasible). This allows objective evaluation of diagnostic characters, either phenotypic or molecular or both. Verification of identifications is crucial but often neglected. Because of clade-specific evolutionary histories, there is currently no single tool for the identification of fungi, although DNA barcoding using the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) remains a first diagnosis, particularly in metabarcoding studies.
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