<i>Fusarium</i> species associated with citrus blackfly (<i>Aleurocanthus woglumi</i>) from an agroecological polyculture in Brazil, including an augmented description of <i>F. volatile</i>

The objectives of this study were to report <i>Fusarium</i> species associated with <i>Aleurocanthus woglumi</i> (Hemiptera: Aleyrodidae) collected from citrus leaves from an agroecological polyculture in Brazil, assess sexual reproductive mode of the species with unknown sexual stages, and provide an augmented description of <i>F. volatile</i>, for which we discovered a sexual stage. Nineteen <i>Fusarium</i> isolates were recovered from <i>A. woglumi</i>. These fungi belong to three species complexes, i.e., the <i>F. chlamydosporum</i> species complex (FCSC), the <i>F. fujikuroi</i> species complex (FFSC), and the <i>F. incarnatum-equiseti</i> species complex (FIESC). Based on multilocus phylogenetic analyses, the species were identified as <i>F. annulatum, F. chlamydosporum, F. pernambucanum, F. sulawesiense, F. verticillioides</i>, and <i>F. volatile</i>. Our results suggest that three species whose sexual stages are unknown (<i>F. chlamydosporum, F. sulawesiense</i>, and <i>F. volatile</i>) are also heterothallic. Intraspecific crosses of <i>F. sulawesiense</i> and <i>F. volatile</i> produced protoperithecia, whereas 66.7% of <i>F. volatile</i> crosses produced fertile perithecia. We provide an augmented description of the latter species to include characteristics of its sexual morph and those observed in the asexual morph that had not yet been described for the species. This study highlights the potential of researching insect-associated fungi to increase knowledge about the diversity, taxonomy, and versatility of <i>Fusarium</i> in ecosystems.