''Gautieria'' is a

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

hypogeal Hypogeal, hypogean, hypogeic and hypogeous (; ) are biological terms describing an organism's activity below the soil surface. In botany, a seed is described as showing hypogeal germination when the cotyledons of the germinating seed remain n ...

fungi in the family

Gomphaceae The Gomphaceae are a diverse family of fungi belonging in what is classically known as the Phallales or cladistically as the ''gomphoid-phalloid clade''. The family has 13 genera Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biologi ...

. They form

mycorrhiza A mycorrhiza (from Greek μύκης ', "fungus", and ῥίζα ', "root"; pl. mycorrhizae, mycorrhiza or mycorrhizas) is a symbiotic association between a fungus and a plant. The term mycorrhiza refers to the role of the fungus in the plant ...

e with various tree species, mostly from the family

Pinaceae The Pinaceae, or pine family, are conifer trees or shrubs, including many of the well-known conifers of commercial importance such as Cedrus, cedars, firs, Tsuga, hemlocks, larches, pines and spruces. The family is included in the order Pinales, ...

. Species are present over much of the world's

temperate In geography, the temperate climates of Earth occur in the middle latitudes (23.5° to 66.5° N/S of Equator), which span between the tropics and the polar regions of Earth. These zones generally have wider temperature ranges throughout t ...

and

boreal forest Taiga (; rus, тайга́, p=tɐjˈɡa; relates to Mongolic and Turkic languages), generally referred to in North America as a boreal forest or snow forest, is a biome characterized by coniferous forests consisting mostly of pines, spruces, ...

habitats. It is well documented that species from this genera are an important part of the diet of the northern flying squirrel ('' Glaucomys sabrinus''). Also, some Australian

marsupials Marsupials are any members of the mammalian infraclass Marsupialia. All extant marsupials are endemic to Australasia, Wallacea and the Americas. A distinctive characteristic common to most of these species is that the young are carried in a po ...

, especially the

rat-kangaroo Potoroidae is a family of marsupials, small Australian animals known as bettongs, potoroos, and rat-kangaroos. All are rabbit-sized, brown, jumping marsupials and resemble a large rodent or a very small wallaby. Taxonomy The potoroids are sma ...

s, feed extensively on these fungi. The fungi also benefit from this relationship: not only do the squirrels help to disperse the spores and propagate the species, studies suggest that passage through the

digestive tract The gastrointestinal tract (GI tract, digestive tract, alimentary canal) is the tract or passageway of the digestive system that leads from the mouth to the anus. The GI tract contains all the major organs of the digestive system, in humans a ...

of a mammal promotes germination of spores.

Taxonomy

The genus name of ''Gautieria'' is in honour of Joseph (Giuseppe) Gautieri (1769 - 1833), who was an Italian doctor and naturalist from

Novara Novara (, Novarese: ) is the capital city of the province of Novara in the Piedmont region in northwest Italy, to the west of Milan. With 101,916 inhabitants (on 1 January 2021), it is the second most populous city in Piedmont after Turin. It is ...

. The genus was first described by Italian doctor and naturalist

Carlo Vittadini Carlo Vittadini (11 June 1800, in Bertonico – 20 November 1865, in Milan) was an Italian physician, doctor and mycology, mycologist. Life He studied in Milan and at the University of Pavia, where he attended the classes given by Giuseppe ...

within Monogr. Vol.25. in 1831. for

hypogeous Hypogeal, hypogean, hypogeic and hypogeous (; ) are biological terms describing an organism's activity below the soil surface. In botany, a seed is described as showing hypogeal germination when the cotyledons of the germinating seed remain no ...

(below-ground)

gasteromycetes The gasteroid fungi are a group of fungi in the Basidiomycota. Species were formerly placed in the obsolete class Gasteromycetes Fr. (literally "stomach fungi"), or the equally obsolete order Gasteromycetales Rea, because they produce spores insi ...

with chambers exposed to the surface and lined with a spore-bearing

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 ...

, a basal

rhizomorph Mycelial cords are linear aggregations of parallel-oriented hyphae. The mature cords are composed of wide, empty vessel hyphae surrounded by narrower sheathing hyphae. Cords may look similar to plant roots, and also frequently have similar functio ...

, and

ovoid An oval () is a closed curve in a plane which resembles the outline of an egg. The term is not very specific, but in some areas (projective geometry, technical drawing, etc.) it is given a more precise definition, which may include either one or ...

fusiform Fusiform means having a spindle-like shape that is wide in the middle and tapers at both ends. It is similar to the lemon-shape, but often implies a focal broadening of a structure that continues from one or both ends, such as an aneurysm on a b ...

striate In geology, a striation is a groove, created by a geological process, on the surface of a rock or a mineral. In structural geology, striations are linear furrows, or linear marks, generated from fault movement. The striation's direction revea ...

-grooved spores. Vittadini's original concept was based on two species he collected in

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

, ''Gauteria morchellaeformis'' and ''Gautieria graveolens''. In 1918, Zeller and Dodge examined various dried

herbarium A herbarium (plural: herbaria) is a collection of preserved plant specimens and associated data used for scientific study. The specimens may be whole plants or plant parts; these will usually be in dried form mounted on a sheet of paper (called ...

collections of ''Gautieria'', and recognized five species. Additional research led to them recognizing 34 species and expanding their generic

concept Concepts are defined as abstract ideas. They are understood to be the fundamental building blocks of the concept behind principles, thoughts and beliefs. They play an important role in all aspects of cognition. As such, concepts are studied by s ...

to include species with a well-developed peridium of

periclinal In structural geology, an anticline is a type of fold that is an arch-like shape and has its oldest beds at its core, whereas a syncline is the inverse of an anticline. A typical anticline is convex up in which the hinge or crest is the l ...

hypha A hypha (; ) is a long, branching, filamentous structure of a fungus, oomycete, or actinobacterium. In most fungi, hyphae are the main mode of vegetative growth, and are collectively called a mycelium. Structure A hypha consists of one or ...

e at maturity. As of 2008, ''Gautieria'' is thought to contain 25 species.

Description

Fruit bodies (gasterocarps) are typically roughly spherical in shape, with a persisting single or branched

. The columella (the central sterile portion of the

sporangium A sporangium (; from Late Latin, ) is an enclosure in which spores are formed. It can be composed of a single cell or can be multicellular. Virtually all plants, fungi, and many other lineages form sporangia at some point in their life cy ...

) are variable in size and shape. The peridium (the wall of the sporangium) is thin and short-lasting. The

gleba Gleba (, from Latin ''glaeba, glēba'', "lump") is the fleshy spore-bearing inner mass of certain fungi such as the puffball or stinkhorn. The gleba is a solid mass of spores, generated within an enclosed area within the sporocarp. The continu ...

is initially white, but later becomes colored by the masses of spores. The

basidia A basidium () is a microscopic sporangium (a spore-producing structure) found on the hymenophore of fruiting bodies of basidiomycete fungi which are also called tertiary mycelium, developed from secondary mycelium. Tertiary mycelium is highly-c ...

are club-shaped, usually two-spored, and with long

filiform Filiform, thread or filament like, can refer to: *Filiform, a common term used in botany to describe a thread-like shape *Filiform, or filiform catheter, a medical device whose component parts or segments are all cylindrical and more or less uni ...

sterigma In biology, a sterigma (pl. sterigmata) is a small supporting structure. It commonly refers to an extension of the basidium (the spore-bearing cells) consisting of a basal filamentous part and a slender projection which carries a spore at the ti ...

ta. Spores are 12–26

µm The micrometre ( international spelling as used by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures; SI symbol: μm) or micrometer (American spelling), also commonly known as a micron, is a unit of length in the International System of Unit ...

long, and

ellipsoid An ellipsoid is a surface that may be obtained from a sphere by deforming it by means of directional scalings, or more generally, of an affine transformation. An ellipsoid is a quadric surface; that is, a surface that may be defined as the ...

in shape.

Species

*'' Gautieria caudata'' (Harkn.) Zeller & C.W.Dodge (1934) *'' Gautieria chengdensis'' J.Z.Ying (1984) *'' Gautieria chilensis'' Zeller & C.W.Dodge (1934) *'' Gautieria clelandii'' G.Cunn. (1941) *'' Gautieria costata'' G.Cunn. (1938) *'' Gautieria crispa'' E.L.Stewart & Trappe (1984) *'' Gautieria drummondii'' Cooke (1892) *'' Gautieria fuegiana'' E. Horak (1964) *'' Gautieria gautierioides'' (Lloyd) Zeller & C.W.Dodge (1934) *'' Gautieria graveolens'' Vittad. (1831) :*''Gautieria graveolens'' f. ''graveolens'' Vittad. (1831) :*''Gautieria graveolens'' f. ''inodora'' A.H.Sm. & Solheim (1953) :*''Gautieria graveolens'' var. ''graveolens'' Vittad. (1831) *'' Gautieria harknessii'' Zeller & C.W.Dodge (1934) *'' Gautieria inapire'' Palfner & E.Horak (2001) *'' Gautieria macrospora'' G.Cunn. (1935) *'' Gautieria magnicellaris'' (Pilát) E.L.Stewart & Trappe (1992) *'' Gautieria mexicana'' (E.Fisch.) Zeller & C.W.Dodge (1934) *'' Gautieria microspora'' Rodway (1929) *'' Gautieria monospora'' G.W.Beaton, Pegler & T.W.K.Young (1985) *'' Gautieria monticola'' Harkn. (1884) *'' Gautieria morchelliformis'' Vittad. (1831) :*''Gautieria morchelliformis'' var. ''globispora'' Pilát (1958) :*''Gautieria morchelliformis'' var. ''magnicellaris'' Pilát (1953) :*''Gautieria morchelliformis'' var. ''microspora'' Wichanský (1962) :*''Gautieria morchelliformis'' var. ''morchelliformis'' Vittad. (1831) :*''Gautieria morchelliformis'' var. ''stenospora'' Pilát (1958) *'' Gautieria novae-zelandiae'' G. Cunn. (1938) *'' Gautieria otthii'' Trog (1857) *'' Gautieria pallida'' Harkn. (1934) *'' Gautieria parksiana'' Zeller & C.W.Dodge (1922) *'' Gautieria plumbea'' Zeller & C.W.Dodge (1918) *'' Gautieria pseudovestita'' Malençon (1976) *'' Gautieria queenslandica'' J.W.Cribb (1958) *'' Gautieria retirugosa'' Fr. (1909) *'' Gautieria sinensis'' J.Z.Ying (1995) *'' Gautieria tasmanica'' Rodway (1929) *'' Gautieria tasmanica'' G.Cunn. (1938) *'' Gautieria trabutii'' (Chatin) Pat. (1897) *'' Gautieria villosa'' Quél. (1878) *'' Gautieria xinjiangensis''

References

External links

* {{Taxonbar, from=Q5527933 Gomphaceae Agaricomycetes genera