Euonymus japonicus, an evergreen shrub, plays important roles in urban greening and has high ornamental and economic value (Huang et al., 2016). In addition, as an important medicinal plant because of its chemical components, E. japonicus leaves show not only antitumour, diuretic, stasis-removing and menstrual-regulating effects, but also possess insecticidal, bactericidal and antiviral activities (Zhu et al., 2012). However, the growth of E. japonicus is often affected by biotic and abiotic factors under natural conditions, including plant diseases such as powdery mildew (Yao et al., 2018) and anthracnose (Wu, 2019). Among these, anthracnose is an important

The Lasiodiplodia are major pathogens or endophytes living on a wide range of plant hosts in tropical and subtropical regions, which can cause stem canker, shoot blight, and rotting of fruits and roots. During an exploration of the stem diseases on Acer truncatum and Cotinus coggygria in northern China, two novel species of Lasiodiplodia, L. acerina G.H. Qiao & W.T. Qin and L. cotini G.H. Qiao & W.T. Qin, were discovered based on integrated studies of the morphological characteristics and phylogenetic analyses of the internal transcribed spacer region (ITS), translation elongation factor 1-α (TEF1-α), beta-tubulin (TUB2) and RNA polymerase II subunit b genes (RPB2). Lasiodiplodia acerina is a sister taxon of L. henannica and distinguishable by smaller paraphysis and larger conidiomata. Lasiodiplodia cotini is closely related to L. citricola but differs in the sequence data and the size of paraphyses. Distinctions between the two novel species and their close relatives were compared and discussed in details. This study updates the knowledge of species diversity of the genus Lasiodiplodia. Furthermore, this is the first report of Lasiodiplodia associated with blighted stems of A. truncatum and C. coggygria in China.