Ustilaginales

Ustilaginales
Huitlacoche
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Fungi
Phylum: Basidiomycota
Subphylum: Ustilaginomycotina
Class: Ustilaginomycetes
Order: Ustilaginales
(G. Winter 1880)[1] Bauer & Oberwinkler 1997[2]
Families

Anthracoideaceae
Cintractiellaceae
Clintamraceae
Geminaginaceae
Melanopsichiaceae
Uleiellaceae
Ustilaginaceae
Websdaneaceae

The Ustilaginales are an order of fungi within the class Ustilaginomycetes. The order contains 8 families, 49 genera, and 851 species.[3]

Ustinaginales is also known and classified as the "smut fungi". They are serious plant pathogens, with only the dikaryotic stage being obligately parasitic.

Morphology

Has a thick-walled resting spore (teliospore), known as the "brand" (burn) spore or chlamydospore.

Economic importance

They can infect corn plants (Zea mays) producing tumor-like galls that render the ears unsaleable. This corn smut, is also known as huitlacoche and sold canned for consumption in Latin America.

See also

References

Notes
  1. ↑ Winter G. (1880). Rabenhorsts Kryptogamen-Flora von Deutschland, Oesterreich und der Schweitz, Vol. 1 (in German). Leipzig: E. Kummer. p. 73. (as "Ustilagineae")
  2. ↑ Bauer, R. et al. (1997). "Ultrastructural markers and systematics in smut fungi and allied taxa.". Canadian Journal of Botany 75: 1311. doi:10.1139/b97-842.
  3. ↑ Kirk MP, Cannon PF, Minter DW, Stalpers JA. (2008). Dictionary of the Fungi. 10th edition. Wallingford: CABI. p. 716–17. ISBN 0-85199-826-7.
Bibliography