Planophila Gerneck, 1907

Darienko, Tatyana & Pröschold, Thomas, 2017, Toward a monograph of non-marine Ulvophyceae using an integrative approach (Molecular phylogeny and systematics of terrestrial Ulvophyceae II.), Phytotaxa 324 (1), pp. 1-41 : 25-26

The genera Planophila Gerneck and Pseudendocloniopsis Vischer

The genus Planophila (with its type species P. laetevirens ) was described by Gerneck (1907) from soil sample with moss protonema. Later, several more species of this genus were proposed. Reisigl (1964) described Planophila bipyrenoidosa from alpine chalk soils. This alga differs from the type species by having a smaller cell size and containing 1–3 pyrenoids. P. terrestris was described by Groover & Hofstetter (1969). Broady (1982) isolated two strains of Planophila A and B from Iceland and Antarctica, respectively. Dangeard (1965) described a new species Ulvella microcystoides , which was later transferred to Planophila by Kornmann & Sahling (1983).

Friedl & O’Kelly (2002) revised the genus Planophila based on SSU phylogeny and TEM. They confirmed that Planophila laetevirens is a member of Ulvophyceae and is not close related to the Planophila A and B of Broady. Planophila A was transferred to the newly erected genus Pabia by Friedl & O’Kelly (2002), and was later synonymized with Pseudochlorella by Darienko et al. (2016). Friedl & O’Kelly (2002) also discovered that Planophila terrestris is a member of the Chloropeltidales and established a new genus Floydiella . They also proposed a new genus Dangemannia for Planophila microcystoides , which was later corrected as Neodangemannia by Wynne & Funari (2014).

Friedl & O’Kelly (2002) also discovered that the monotypic genus Pseudendocloniopsis (type species: P. botryoides ), which was described by Vischer (1933), is closely related to Planophila . Printz (1964) transferred the genus Filoprotococcus to Pseudendocloniopsis ; however, this combination is invalid because the name Filoprotococcus is older.

In our study, we investigated seven strains that could be clearly identified as P. laetevirens and P. bipyrenoidosa . For both species, we proposed the following lectotypes and epitypes.