lichen
A lichen ( , ) is a composite organism that arises from algae or cyanobacteria living among filaments of multiple fungi species in a mutualistic relationship.Cladoniaceae. Found in Cameroon, it was formally described as a new species in 2016 by lichenologists
Teuvo Ahti
Teuvo ("Ted") Tapio Ahti (born 1934) is a Finnish botanist and lichenologist. He has had a long career at the University of Helsinki that started in 1963, and then following his retirement in 1997, at the Botanical Museum of the Finnish Museum ...
and Adam Flakus. The type specimen was collected on Minloua Mountain, west of Yaoundé, at an altitude of . Here the lichen was found growing among plant debris over rock in open areas. The species is only known to occur in two locations on Minloua Mountain, which is a tropical inselberg. Secondary chemicals that are found in the lichen include
barbatic acid
Barbatic acid is an organic compound that is made by some lichens. It is in the structural class known as depsides. It is particularly common in the genera ''Usnea'' (the beard lichens) and ''Cladonia''.
History
The compound was first isolated ...
(a major metabolite) and didymic acid (a minor component).