''Zygnema'' is a genus of
freshwater filamentous
thalloid
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 ...
alga
Algae (; singular alga ) is an informal term for a large and diverse group of photosynthetic eukaryotic organisms. It is a polyphyletic grouping that includes species from multiple distinct clades. Included organisms range from unicellular mic ...
comprising about 100 species.
A terrestrial species, ''Z. terrestre'', is known from India. ''Zygnema'' grows as a free-floating mass of filaments, although young plants may be found anchored to streambeds with a
holdfast. The filaments form a yellow-green to bright green colored tangled mat, and are composed of elongate barrel-shaped cells, each with two star-shaped (stellate)
chloroplasts arrayed along the axis of the cell.
Species
Some species include:
*
''Z. atrocoeruleum''
*
''Z. binuclearioides''
*
''Z. carinthiacum''
*
''Z. carteri''
*
''Z. circumcarinatum''
*
''Z. coeruleum''
*
''Z. conspicuum''
*
''Z. cruciatum''
*
''Z. cyanosphaeroidicum''
*
''Z. cylindricum''
*
''Z. cylindrospermum''
*
''Z. fanicum''
*
''Z. gorakhporense''
*
''Z. insigne''
*
''Z. kashmirense''
*
''Z. kiangsiense''
*
''Z. leiospermum''
*
''Z. melanosporum''
*
''Z. momoniense''
*
''Z. normanii''
*
''Z. oveidanum''
*
''Z. pectinatum''
*
''Z. peliosporum''
*
''Z. quadrispirale''
*
''Z. ralfsii''
*
''Z. rivulare''
*
''Z. ruviatum''
*
''Z. schwabei''
*
''Z. spontaneum''
*
''Z. stagnale''
*
''Z. stellinum''
*
''Z. subtile''
*
''Z. tenue''
*
''Z. tenuissimum''
*
''Z. terrestre''
*
''Z. vaginatum''
*
''Z. vaucherii''
*
''Z. verrucosum''
References
Zygnemataceae
Charophyta genera
{{alga-stub