Serpula (fungus)
| Serpula | |
|---|---|
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| Serpula lacrymans | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Fungi |
| Division: | Basidiomycota |
| Class: | Agaricomycetes |
| Order: | Boletales |
| Family: | Serpulaceae |
| Genus: |
Serpula (Pers.) Gray (1821) |
| Type species | |
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Serpula destruens (Pers.) Gray (1821) |
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| Species | |
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See text |
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| Synonyms | |
See text
Serpula is a genus of fungi in the family Serpulaceae.
The term was originally defined by Christiaan Hendrik Persoon as a section of the genus Merulius in 1801. British botanist Samuel Frederick Gray raised it to genus status in his 1821 work The Natural Arrangement of British Plants. The name is derived from the Latin verb serpěre "to creep". Synonyms include Johann Heinrich Friedrich Link's 1809 Xylophagous, Christian Hendrik Persoon's 1825 Xylomyzon, Narcisse Théophile Patouillard's 1874 Gyrophora, and Patouillard's 1897 Gyrophana.
Serpula forms a clade with at least two other closely related genera, Austropaxillus and Gymnopaxillus, the three composing the family Serpulaceae. It is thought that the common ancestor was saprotrophic,and that ancestor to the latter two genera became mycorrhizal. Using molecular clock analysis, the split between Austropaxillus and Serpula has been estimated to have occurred about 34.9 mya, roughly coinciding with the separation of South America and Australia from Antarctica.
The number of species is uncertain – the two species S. lacrymans and S. himantioides have been considered to be a single species, or the latter species has possibly five cryptic species within its complex.
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