''Lobariella robusta'' is a species of

foliose lichen Foliose lichen is one of the morphological classes of lichens, which are complex organisms that arise from the symbiotic relationship between fungi and a photosynthetic partner, typically algae. This partnership allows lichen to live in diverse ...

in the family

Peltigeraceae The Peltigeraceae are a family of lichens in the order Peltigerales. The Peltigeraceae, which contains 15 genera and about 600 species, has recently (2018) been emended to include the families Lobariaceae and Nephromataceae. Many Peltigeraceae sp ...

. Found in

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only stat ...

, it was formally described as a new species in 2017 by lichenologists

Robert Lücking Robert Lücking (born 1964) is a German lichenologist. He is a leading expert on foliicolous lichens–lichens that live on leaves. Life and career Born in Ulm in 1964, Lücking earned both his master's (1990) and PhD degree (1994) at the Univer ...

Bibiana Moncada and Clifford Smith. The

type specimen In biology, a type is a particular wiktionary:en:specimen, specimen (or in some cases a group of specimens) of an organism to which the scientific name of that organism is formally attached. In other words, a type is an example that serves to a ...

was collected by Smith from the Keck Observation Headquarters ( Waimea) at an elevation of . Here, in a

mesic habitat In ecology, a mesic habitat is a type of habitat with a moderate or well-balanced supply of moisture, e.g., a mesic forest, a temperate hardwood forest, or dry-mesic prairie. Mesic habitats transition to xeric shrublands in a non-linear fashion, ...

with open-landscaped parkland, the lichen grows on tree trunks. Its

thalli Thallus (plural: thalli), from Latinized Greek (), meaning "a green shoot" or "twig", is the vegetative tissue of some organisms in diverse groups such as algae, fungi, some liverworts, lichens, and the Myxogastria. Many of these organisms were ...

, closely attached to their substrate, are up to in diameter with a smooth, light green upper surface colour that becomes pale green-grey to yellowish grey after drying. It is only known to occur at the type locality. Secondary chemicals that are found in the lichen include pseudocyphellarin A, 4-''O''-methyl-gyrophoric acid, and

gyrophoric acid Gyrophoric acid is a depside that can be found in the lichen ''Cryptothecia rubrocincta'' and in ''Xanthoparmelia pokomyi''. It can also be found in most of the species of the '' Actinogyra'', ''Lasallia'', and ''Umbilicaria'' genera Genus ( p ...

. The

specific epithet In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

refers to the "rather robust, leathery thallus".

References

Peltigerales Lichen species Lichens described in 2017 Lichens of Hawaii Taxa named by Robert Lücking Fungi without expected TNC conservation status {{Peltigerales-stub