''Coprinites'' is an extinct

monotypic In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispe ...

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

of gilled

fungus A fungus ( : fungi or funguses) is any member of the group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds, as well as the more familiar mushrooms. These organisms are classified as a kingdom, separately from t ...

in the Agaricales family

Agaricaceae The Agaricaceae are a family of basidiomycete fungi and include the genus ''Agaricus'', as well as basidiomycetes previously classified in the families Tulostomataceae, Lepiotaceae, and Lycoperdaceae. Taxonomy The family Agaricaceae was publishe ...

. At present it contains the single

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

''Coprinites dominicana''. The genus is solely known from the early

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first epoch (geology), geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and mea ...

Burdigalian The Burdigalian is, in the geologic timescale, an age or stage in the early Miocene. It spans the time between 20.43 ± 0.05 Ma and 15.97 ± 0.05 Ma (million years ago). Preceded by the Aquitanian, the Burdigalian was the first and longest w ...

stage,

Dominican amber Dominican amber is amber from the Dominican Republic derived from resin of the extinct tree '' Hymenaea protera''. Dominican amber differentiates itself from Baltic amber by being nearly always transparent, and it has a higher number of fossil inc ...

deposits on the island of Hispaniola. ''Coprinites'' is one of only four known agarics fungus species known in the fossil record and the first of three to be described from Dominican amber.

History and classification

The genus is known only from the single

holotype A holotype is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism, known to have been used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of sever ...

"''AF-9-11''", a single fruiting body,

mushroom A mushroom or toadstool is the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus, typically produced above ground, on soil, or on its food source. ''Toadstool'' generally denotes one poisonous to humans. The standard for the name "mushroom" is ...

, specimen currently residing in the Poinar collections maintained by the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

. The specimen was collected from the La Toca amber mine, northeast of

Santiago de los Caballeros Santiago de los Caballeros (; '' en, Saint James of the Knights''), often shortened to Santiago, is the second-largest city in the Dominican Republic and the fourth-largest city in the Caribbean by population. It is the capital of Santiago Prov ...

, in the

Cordillera Septentrional The Cordillera Septentrional is a mountain range that runs parallel to the north coast of the Dominican Republic, with extensions to the northwest as Tortuga (Haiti), Tortuga island in Haiti, and to the southeast through lowlands to where it rises ...

area of the

Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic ( ; es, República Dominicana, ) is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean region. It occupies the eastern five-eighths of the island, which it shares with ...

. It was first studied by Dr. George Poinar of the UC, Berkeley and Dr. Rolf Singer from the Field Museum of Natural History in

Chicago, Illinois (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

. Poinar and Singer published their 1990

type description A species description is a formal description of a newly discovered species, usually in the form of a scientific paper. Its purpose is to give a clear description of a new species of organism and explain how it differs from species that have be ...

in the journal ''

Science Science is a systematic endeavor that Scientific method, builds and organizes knowledge in the form of Testability, testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earli ...

''. The generic epithet ''Coprinites'' is in reference to the genus similarity to the modern genus ''

Coprinus ''Coprinus'' is a small genus of mushroom-forming fungi consisting of ''Coprinus comatus''the shaggy ink cap (British) or shaggy mane (American)and several of its close relatives. Until 2001, ''Coprinus'' was a large genus consisting of all ag ...

''. The specific epithet "''dominicana''" was coined by the authors in reference to the Dominican Republic where the fossil was recovered. When initially published ''Coprinites dominicana'' was the first species of agaric fungus to be described. Two more species '' Protomycena electra'' and '' Aureofungus yaniguaensis'' have since been described from fossils found in the amber mines of the Dominican Republic, while the fourth species '' Archaeomarasmius leggeti'' is from older

Cretaceous The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 145 to 66 million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era, as well as the longest. At around 79 million years, it is the longest geological period of th ...

age

New Jersey Amber New Jersey Amber, sometimes called Raritan amber, is amber found in the Raritan and Magothy Formations of the Central Atlantic (Eastern) coast of the United States. It is dated to the Late Cretaceous, Turonian age, based on pollen analysis of th ...

. With the 2007 publication of a fifth extinct agaric species, '' Palaeoagaracites antiquus'' the age for the order was pushed back to the

Albian The Albian is both an age of the geologic timescale and a stage in the stratigraphic column. It is the youngest or uppermost subdivision of the Early/Lower Cretaceous Epoch/Series. Its approximate time range is 113.0 ± 1.0 Ma to 100.5 ± 0.9 M ...

(approximately 100 Ma).

Description

The holotype of ''Coprinites'' is a lone fruiting body without any associated structures and a partly disarticulated stipe preserved in a piece of clear yellow amber approximately and weight . The pileus is in diameter and has a convex shape sporting a small central depression. The brownish-pink flesh is thin with a scaly-pectinate surface. The margin is striated and slightly flared. ''Coprinites'' sports fifteen nondeccurent

lamellae Lamella (plural lamellae) means a small plate or flake in Latin, and in English may refer to: Biology * Lamella (mycology), a papery rib beneath a mushroom cap * Lamella (botany) * Lamella (surface anatomy), a plate-like structure in an animal * ...

, or gills, which reach the outer pileus and thirteen lamellulae, short gills which do not reach the edge, of varying lengths. The pileus is centered on the stipe, which is in diameter and incomplete, with part of the stipe base preserved in the amber next to the pileus. The light brown basidiospores, present on the

hymenium The hymenium is the tissue layer on the hymenophore of a fungal fruiting body where the cells develop into basidia or asci, which produce spores. In some species all of the cells of the hymenium develop into basidia or asci, while in others some ...

associated with the fruiting body, are smooth and ellipsoidal to oblong. Each basidiospore is approximately 6 to 7 μm long and appear to possess a germ pore. ''Coprinites'' was originally placed in the family Coprinaceae based on the visible structures, or macromorphology of the fruiting body and the microscopic features preserved in the amber specimen. The combination of characters present did not match any modern genus of the mushroom order Agaricales leading Poinar and Singer to erect the genus ''Coprinites''. The lack of autodeliquescence along with the mushrooms morphology lead

David Hibbett David Hibbett is an associate professor in biology at Clark University. He is considered one of today's leading researchers "in the analysis of fungal relationships through DNA analysis." At Clark he concentrates his lab work in evolutionary biolo ...

, Michael Donoghue and David Grimaldi to question the placement of ''Coprinites''. They noted the characters of the genus are similar to those of genus ''

Leucocoprinus ''Leucocoprinus'' is a genus of fungi in the family Agaricaceae. Its best-known member is the distinctive yellow mushroom '' Leucocoprinus birnbaumii'', which is found in plant pots and greenhouses worldwide. The type species is '' Leucocoprinus ...

'' mushrooms. They suggested that ''Coprinites'' could be treated as either a member of Coprinaceae or

, to which ''Leucocoprinus'' belongs. With a number of molecular studies a large portion of the genera formerly placed in Coprinaceae, including ''Coprinus'', have been moved into Agaricaceae. Thus supporting the suggestion of Hibbet, Donoghue, and Grimaldi.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q5168923 †Protomycena †Protomycena Prehistoric fungi Natural history of Hispaniola Fossil taxa described in 1997 Miocene life Natural history of the Dominican Republic Neogene fungi Taxa named by Rolf Singer Taxa named by George Poinar Jr.