Chiodecton complexum
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| Chiodecton complexum | |
|---|---|
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Fungi |
| Division: | Ascomycota |
| Class: | Arthoniomycetes |
| Order: | Arthoniales |
| Family: | Roccellaceae |
| Genus: | Chiodecton |
| Species: | C. complexum |
| Binomial name | |
| Chiodecton complexum Aptroot & M.Cáceres (2014) | |
 Holotype: Federal University of Rondônia campus, Brazil | |
Chiodecton complexum is a species of corticolous (bark-dwelling) crustose lichen in the family Roccellaceae.[1] Described from Brazil in 2014, this lichen has since been found across multiple Brazilian states from the Amazon to the Atlantic coast, as well as in Panama. The species forms a greenish-gray crusty growth on tree bark and produces both powdery patches called soredia for asexual reproduction and immersed fruiting structures arranged in branched lines for sexual reproduction. It can be found growing on smooth bark in lowland rainforests, including both native trees in primary forest and cultivated rubber trees in plantation settings.
Chiodecton complexum was introduced in 2014 by André Aptroot and Marcela Cáceres. The type material was collected by the authors on smooth tree bark at the Federal University of Rondônia campus south of Porto Velho, (Rondônia Brazil), at an elevation of roughly 100 m (330 ft).[2]
The authors diagnosed it as a corticolous (bark-dwelling) species of Chiodecton with discrete soralia and apothecia that are immersed and arranged in branched lines within small stromata; the spores are hyaline and three-septate.[2]
Within the genus, it differs from C. pustuliferum (the only other sorediate species then known) by lacking that species' paler, much thicker thallus and black, fibrous (byssoid) border, and from the Australasian C. leptosporum by having soredia, apothecia clustered in lines rather than evenly dispersed, and longer conidia.[2]