Morphological and molecular identification of Diaporthe species in south-western China, with description of eight new species

Diaporthe species have often been reported as plant pathogens, endophytes and saprophytes, commonly isolated from a wide range of infected plant hosts. In the present study, twenty strains obtained from leaf spots of twelve host plants in Yunnan Province of China were isolated. Based on a combination of morphology, culture characteristics and multilocus sequence analysis of the rDNA internal transcribed spacer region (ITS), translation elongation factor 1-α ( TEF ), β -tubulin ( TUB ), calmodulin ( CAL ), and histone ( HIS ) genes, these strains were identified as eight new species: Diaporthe camelliae-sinensis , D. grandiflori , D. heliconiae , D. heterostemmatis , D. litchii , D. lutescens , D. melastomatis , D. pungensis and two previously described species, D. subclavata and D. tectonendophytica . This study showed high species diversity of Diaporthe in tropical rain forests and its hosts in south-western China.