Gracilaria subgen. Corallopsis Gurgel, J.N. Norris et Fredericq

Gurgel, Carlos Frederico D., Norris, James N., Schmidt, William E., Le, Hau Nhu & Fredericq, Suzanne, 2018, Systematics of the Gracilariales (Rhodophyta) including new subfamilies, tribes, subgenera, and two new genera, Agarophyton gen. nov. and Crassa gen. nov., Phytotaxa 374 (1), pp. 1-23 : 7-8

Gracilaria subgen. Corallopsis Gurgel, J.N. Norris et Fredericq , stat. et comb. nov.

TYPE: Corallopsis Greville 1830 : liii.

TYPE SPECIES: Corallopsis salicornia (C. Agardh) Greville 1830 : liii; basionym: Sphaerococcus salicornia C. Agardh, 1820 : pl. VI, which is now Gracilaria salicornia (C. Agardh) E.Y. Dawson 1954: 4 .

TYPE LOCALITY: “ ad litora Unalaschka, ” [Alaska] ( Agardh 1820, 1822); probably mistakenly cited, Dawson (1954: 4) noted locale more likely is from Manila Bay, Philippine Islands, and Abbott (1994) stated due to a mix-up of labels.

DIAGNOSIS: Spermatangia confined to deep cortical conceptacles or pits (i.e., the verrucosa - type sensu Yamamoto 1975, 1978) embedded only in the cortex and not interacting with medullary cells. Gonimoblasts composed of loosely arranged ovoid vacuolated cells bearing clusters of carposporangia at the periphery in short branched chains; nutritive tubular cells extending to top, sides, and base of outer pericarp, multinucleate, inflated towards base, sometimes with more than one tubular cell fusion with pericarp cell; pericarp fusion cells tubular or branched; pericarp cells arranged regularly in young cystocarps, the inner layers darkly staining and stretched laterally at maturity; carpogonial fusion cell multinucleate, cubic to ovoid in young carposporophytes, compressed in older cystocarps, embedded within inner pericarp. Tetrasporangia superficial, not in sori.

REMARKS: The name Corallopsis Greville (1830) appears in the same publication as Gracilaria and both are validly published names, with the latter conserved ( Steentoft et al. 1991).

PERTINENT SPECIES IN GRACILARIA SUBGEN. CORALLOPSIS : Gracilaria articulata C.F.Chang et B.M.Xia ; G. dura (C.Agardh) J.Agardh ; G. gracilis (Stackhouse) Steentoft, Irvine et Farnham ; G. canaliculata Sonder ; G. pacifica I.A. Abbott ; G. salicornia (C. Agardh) E.Y. Dawson.

Based on other published studies: G. rhodymenioides A. Millar (see Muangmai et al. (2017).