A taxonomic review of Penicillium section Charlesia

Penicillium section Charlesia was established based on a multigene phylogeny of P. charlesii, P. coffeae, P. fellutanum, P. georgiense, P. indicum and P. phoeniceum. Since then, three additional species were described in the section. Species can occur on a wide range of substrata including soil, corn, coffee, water, air, deteriorating cloth and clinical samples. The majority of species in section Charlesia grow restricted on Czapek yeast extract agar and produce smooth-walled, vesiculate, monoverticillate conidiophores. A limited number of studies have reviewed the taxonomy of this section. In the present study, available strains belonging to section Charlesia were evaluated in a multilocus phylogenetic analysis using the ITS rDNA region, partial β-tubulin (BenA), calmodulin (CaM) and RNA polymerase II second largest subunit (RPB2) sequences. This analysis revealed 12 distinct species, including three that are newly described here as Penicillium aspericonidium, P. fusiforme and P. longiconidiophorum. The macromorphology on different media, vesicle width, stipe length and ornamentation, and conidial shape and size are important morphological characters for distinguishing species of section Charlesia.