Morphological differentiation of cryptic lineages within the invasive genus Asparagopsis (Bonnemaisoniales, Rhodophyta)

Macroalgal diversity of Santa Cesarea-Castro (Salento Peninsula, southeastern Italy)

“…Two species, A. armata Harvey and A. taxiformis, are currently reported from the Mediterranean Sea, but to date gametophytes have never been collected in Apulia, where only the Falkenbergia phase, arbitrarily attributed to A. armata occurs (Cormaci & al., 2001). In the past, tetrasporophyte identification was based only on inference from the presence of the respective gametophytes or by DNA sequencing (Andreakis & al., 2004;Ní Chualaín & al., 2004), but in a recent paper, Zanolla & al. (2014) proposed a set of useful diagnostic characters to discriminate them.…”

Molecular Assisted Identification Reveals Hidden Red Algae Diversity from the Burica Peninsula, Pacific Panama

“…This lineage contained specimens distributed widely within the Pacific and Indian Oceans including specimens from the Gulf of Panama and Costa Rica [56]. The taxonomic status of this lineage requires further study, but its genetic distiction [56,57] and recent morphological differentiation from other lineages [58] suggests that it represents a biological species distinct from A. taxiformis.…”

“…Zanolla et al [58] reported that Falkenbergia-stage specimens of A. taxiformis lineages could be morphologically distinguished by the length and width of axial cells, width of apical cells and thickness of cell walls. While measurements of these characters from Punta Burica specimens overlap with those cited for Lineage 4 by Zanolla et al [58], a greater level of variation was seen. PHYKOS-4643 sequences were found to have closest homology to GenBank sequences from specimens identified as Plocamium pacificum Kylin (rbcL-3P 99%; COI-5P 95%), or P. 'cartilagineum' (Linnaeus) P.S.…”

Environmental effects on growth and fatty acids in three isolates of Derbesia tenuissima (Bryopsidales, Chlorophyta)

“…Many of the larger filament sizes previously reported are field-collected samples from the North Atlantic and Southern Australia with filament diameter of up to 80 μm [34] while Mediterranean isolates had smaller filament diameter (30-50 μm) [35] that were even smaller in culture (30 μm) [36]. Variation in morphology within species has been reported for many seaweeds including Asparagopsis taxiformis [45], Caulerpa taxifolia [46] and Dictyota dichotoma [47] and was attributed to both environmental plasticity and differences between genotypes. Therefore, we propose that the observed variation in the diameter of filaments in D. tenuissima reported in our study and the disparity with the previously reported diameter of filaments are within the natural variation of this species.…”