Systematics of the Genus Cordyceps (Ascomycota, Hypocreales) and the Evolution of Host-shifts

小行星9806936 棒菌科（子囊菌门：肉座菌目（Hypocreales）是一个多样的单系真菌家族，它不寻常的是完全由其他生物的专性共生体组成：草，节肢动物或其他真菌。 其中一些物种具有经济重要性;例如，它们包括导致绵羊“蹒跚”的草内生菌。 冬虫夏草是棒虫草科中最多样化的属，无论是在物种数量还是在其形态上，都有非常广泛的宿主。 冬虫夏草和棒菌科的宿主范围与严格的物种形成假说（“宿主追踪”）不一致;如果是这样，那么一旦一个物种与特定的宿主联系在一起，那么它的所有后代都会与该宿主及其后代联系在一起。 有人提出，目前的宿主范围的虫草和棒菌科出现通过一个复杂的系列间和王国内的主机转移。 需要对这些真菌的历史（真菌发生）进行强有力的重建来验证这一假设。 目前尚无此类产品。 在这项研究中，约瑟夫·斯帕塔福拉和理查德·亨伯将对虫草属和相关的棒形目真菌进行系统的调查。 他们将利用DNA序列数据和形态学研究的特征重建真菌的进化史。 然后，他们将利用无性生殖来开发基于无性生殖的虫草属下分类，将无性真菌（无性型）整合到虫草的分类中，并描述该属内宿主转移的历史。 这项工作应该形成一个坚实的基础，为正在进行的和未来的生物学工作，这智力刺激和经济上重要的真菌组。

9806936 SPATAFORA The Clavicipitaceae (Ascomycota: Hypocreales) is a diverse, monophyletic family of fungi that is unusual in being composed entirely of obligate symbionts of other organisms: grasses, arthropods, or other fungi. A number of these species are of economic importance; they include, for example, the grass endophyte responsible for "staggers" in sheep. Cordyceps is the most diverse genus of the Clavicipitaceae, both in terms of number of species and in its morphology and remarkably wide range of hosts. The host range exhibited by Cordyceps and the Clavicipitaceae is inconsistent with a hypothesis of strict cospeciation ("host tracking"); if it were, then once a species became associated with a particular host, then all of its descendants would be associated with that host and its descendants. It is proposed that the current host range of Cordyceps and the Clavicipitaceae arose via a complex series of inter- and intrakingdom host-shifts. A robust reconstruction of the history (phylogeny) of these fungi is needed to test this hypothesis. None is currently available. In this research, Joseph Spatafora and Richard Humber will conduct a systematic investigation of the genus Cordyceps and allied clavicipitacean fungi. They will reconstruct the phylogeny of the fungi using characters from DNA sequence data and morphological studies. They will then use the phylogeny to develop a phylogenetically-based infrageneric classification of Cordyceps, integrate asexual fungi (anamorphs) into the classification of Cordyceps, and describe the history of host-shifts within the genus. The work should form a firm basis for ongoing and future work on the biology of this intellectually stimulating and economically important group of fungi.