Anthracocarpon
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| Anthracocarpon | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Anthracocarpon virescens, showing sectioned perithecia (fruiting bodies) with carbonised walls | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Fungi |
| Division: | Ascomycota |
| Class: | Eurotiomycetes |
| Order: | Verrucariales |
| Family: | Verrucariaceae |
| Genus: | Anthracocarpon Breuss (1996) |
| Type species | |
| Anthracocarpon virescens (Zahlbr.) Breuss (1996) | |
| Species | |
Anthracocarpon is a small fungal genus in the family Verrucariaceae.[1] It is found in Mediterranean regions, the Caribbean, and South America. These lichens form low, crusty patches made up of overlapping scales that grow close to the ground on limestone and other rocky surfaces. The genus is recognized by its distinctive coal-black fruiting bodies, which give it its name—derived from Greek words meaning "coal" and "fruit". Established in 1996, the genus currently includes three species.
The Austrian lichenologist Othmar Breuss circumscribed Anthracocarpon in 1996 during his revision of the polyphyletic genus Catapyrenium. He removed the Mediterranean species then known as Dermatocarpon virescens and set it apart on three linked characters: its scale-forming squamulose thallus, the coal-black (carbonised) wall of the perithecia, and pycnidia with a single, Staurothele-type cavity rather than the multi-locular form seen in many allied Verrucariaceae. Breuss coined the generic name from Greek ἄνθραξ (ánthrax, "coal") and καρπός (karpós, "fruit'), a direct nod to those soot-black fruiting bodies. Subsequent phylogenetic and anatomical work has confirmed Anthracocarpon as a distinct, small lineage within the catapyrenioid clade of Verrucariaceae.[2]
Although first treated as monospecific,[2] the genus has since expanded to three accepted species. Breuss added A. caribaeum in 1999 from humid limestone forest in Puerto Rico; it differs from the type species in its smaller, paler squamules, basally pale perithecial wall, and more regularly ellipsoidal spores.[3] A decade later María Prieto, Gregorio Aragón Rubio and Breuss described A. andinum from high-elevation sites in northern Argentina; this Andean taxon has thicker, sulcate squamules, paler rhizines, and measurably broader, shorter ascospores than A. virescens.[4]