''Niesslia'' 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 ...

fungi 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 ...

in the family

Niessliaceae The Niessliaceae are a family of fungi in the Ascomycota, class Sordariomycetes Sordariomycetes is a class of fungi in the subdivision Pezizomycotina (Ascomycota), consisting of 28 orders, 90 families, 1344 genera. Sordariomycetes is from the ...

. It was

circumscribed In geometry, the circumscribed circle or circumcircle of a polygon is a circle that passes through all the vertices of the polygon. The center of this circle is called the circumcenter and its radius is called the circumradius. Not every polyg ...

by German mycologist

Bernhard Auerswald Bernhard Auerswald (1818–1870) was a German mycologist and professor from Leipzig. He participated as chief correspondent of botany, sending specimens that his colleague Heinrich Moritz Willkomm Heinrich Moritz Willkomm (29 June 1821, Herwigs ...

in 1869, with '' Niesslia chaetomium'' assigned as the

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen ...

. These organisms, which are barely visible to the naked eye, are found in decaying plant matter and are

parasites Parasitism is a Symbiosis, close relationship between species, where one organism, the parasite, lives on or inside another organism, the Host (biology), host, causing it some harm, and is Adaptation, adapted structurally to this way of lif ...

of lichens, other fungi, or

nematode The nematodes ( or grc-gre, Νηματώδη; la, Nematoda) or roundworms constitute the phylum Nematoda (also called Nemathelminthes), with plant-Parasitism, parasitic nematodes also known as eelworms. They are a diverse animal phylum inhab ...

eggs. They belong to the

ascomycetes Ascomycota is a phylum of the kingdom Fungi that, together with the Basidiomycota, forms the subkingdom Dikarya. Its members are commonly known as the sac fungi or ascomycetes. It is the largest phylum of Fungi, with over 64,000 species. The defi ...

and in their teleomorphic (sexual) stage they form distinctive dark brown shiny

fruiting bodies The sporocarp (also known as fruiting body, fruit body or fruitbody) of fungi is a multicellular structure on which spore-producing structures, such as basidia or asci, are borne. The fruitbody is part of the sexual phase of a fungal life cyc ...

with spines. The fruiting body structures are a flask-shaped type called

perithecia An ascocarp, or ascoma (), is the fruiting body ( sporocarp) of an ascomycete phylum fungus. It consists of very tightly interwoven hyphae and millions of embedded asci, each of which typically contains four to eight ascospores. Ascocarps are mo ...

where the spores escape through ostioles. The asexual

anamorphic Anamorphic format is the cinematography technique of shooting a widescreen picture on standard 35 mm film or other visual recording media with a non-widescreen native aspect ratio. It also refers to the projection format in which a distorted ...

stage was given the genus name ''Monocillium'', now considered a

synonym A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are all ...

Species

Species Fungorum ''Index Fungorum'' is an international project to index all formal names (scientific names) in the fungus kingdom. the project is based at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, one of three partners along with Landcare Research and the Institute of Mi ...

accepts 98 species of Niesslia. Many species were formally described as new to science in 2019 after a

phylogenetic In biology, phylogenetics (; from Greek φυλή/ φῦλον [] "tribe, clan, race", and wikt:γενετικός, γενετικός [] "origin, source, birth") is the study of the evolutionary history and relationships among or within groups o ...

framework for the genus was proposed based on

molecular phylogenetic Molecular phylogenetics () is the branch of phylogeny that analyzes genetic, hereditary molecular differences, predominantly in DNA sequences, to gain information on an organism's evolutionary relationships. From these analyses, it is possible to ...

References

Sordariomycetes genera Lichenicolous fungi Niessliaceae Taxa described in 1869 {{Hypocreales-stub