A new record of pyrenocarpous lichen to the Indian biota

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India has a rich diversity of lichens, including the pyrenocarpous lichens, which is a group of lichens that have flask-shaped ascocarps (fruiting bodies) called perithecia. Pyrenocarpous taxa commonly grow on the bark of a number of trees or sometimes on rocks, soil, or leaves in moist tropical and temperate regions of the world. The Western Ghats and eastern Himalayan regions hold the highest number of cryptogams together with lichens (Sinha et al. 2018). Both regions are rich in biodiversity so far and lichenologically were investigated by various workers for doing revisionary and floristic studies of the states. Aptroot (2012) revised the genus Anthracothecium and Pyrenula and listed 155 species of Anthracothecium and 745 species of Pyrenula from different parts of the world including India. India is represented by the occurrence of the 350 species of 44 genera and 11 families of pyrenocarpous lichens (Singh & Sinha 2010). Upreti (1990) described 10 species of Pyrenula, exhibiting Pyrenula subducta (Nyl.) Müll. Arg., spore type of which seven species were new records to the Indian lichen biota. Awasthi (1991) consolidated the information of different lichen genera in a key to the microlichens India, Nepal & Sri Lanka and enumerated 229 species of pyrenocarpous lichens. Upreti (1991aUpreti ( ,b, 1992Upreti ( , 1993a  Based on a revisionary study of Pyrenula, the aim of the present study is to provide a new record for lichen biota.

Materials and Methods
The present study is based on freshly collected specimens from Iravangallaru located at Megamalai Wildlife Sanctuary, Tamil Nadu ( Figure 1) and previously collected sample from Arunchal Pradesh's specimens NOTE New record of pyrenocarpous lichen Rajaprabu et al.

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deposited in the herbarium CSIR-National Botanical Research Institute, Lucknow (LWG). Morphological and anatomical characters were examined using stereo zoom Leica S8APO and light DM2500 microscopes attached with camera. Thin sections of perithecia were cut using a razor blade under the stereoscope zoom microscope. All anatomical measurements were recorded in plain water, while 10% KOH was used for detailed study of asci and ascospores. For spot tests the usual reagents of K, C, and P were used and for identification of lichens substance by thin layer chromatography (TLC) was performed in solvent system C following Orange et al. Thallus corticolous, corticate, smooth, continuous, thin, up to 10cm across, pale yellow to yellowishbrown, without pseudocyphellae; prothallus indistinct; photobiont trentepohlia. Ascomata perithecioid, simple, dispersed, conical, emergent, 0.3-0.5 mm diam., black, edges without thallus covering; ostioles eccentric to lateral, red-brown, pointing in various directions; hamathecium hyaline, densely inspersed with oil droplets; asci cylindrical to clavate, 4-8 spored, 40-48 × 10-12.5 μm; ascospores brown, 3-septate, 16-22
Ecology and distribution: The species is found growing on smooth bark of trees at altitudes of between 1,747-2,575 m in the Arunachal Pradesh and Tamil Nadu states of India. Previously, this species is known only from Singapore (Aptroot et al. 2012). This species is a new record for India.

Results and Discussion
The pyrenocarpous lichens communities are a good indicator of young and regenerated forest type. The rich diversity of lichens clearly indicates that most of the forest within the eastern Himalayan region has good health of forest (Singh 1999;Rout et al. 2010

Conclusion
The evergreen forest in both the regions exhibit the maximum diversity of Pyrenula species. The smooth bark trees along the streams in moist shady habitat bear pyrenolichens mostly the species Pyrenula on bark, leaves and rocks. Due to dense virgin forests that cover tracts of land in moist regions of the states are suitable for growth of Pyrenula lichens. Therefore, occurrence of Pyrenula species indicates an evergreen forest with abundance of smooth barked trees. The present investigation is of a preliminary nature, a more intensive and extensive survey will definitely add additional Pyrenula taxa to the country.