Diorygma megasporum

The lichen forms a thin, matt crust 50–100 micrometres (μm) thick that ranges from off-white through cream to pale grey-green. The surface is uneven, cracked along the elongated fruiting slits, and lacks a true outer skin (pseudocortex). Green algal cells reach almost to the surface, while a medulla 0–10 μm below may hold tiny crystals. Fruiting bodies (lirellae) are plentiful, measuring 0.5–4 × 0.2–0.7 mm. They lie immersed at first, but their pale, powder-dusted flanks often appear through fine cracks as the thallus matures. Margins are indistinct, only rarely rising into a thin rim separated from the crust by a slit. The disc itself opens narrowly, carrying a thick pale-grey to buff bloom (pruina). The supporting wall (excipulum) is inconspicuous and yellowish at the base, laterally pale yellow-brown and built from loosely interwoven, swollen hyphae. Inside, a clear hymenium 180–200 μm tall stains bluish-violet in iodine along its upper and outer zones, while the top 30 μm are brown owing to a well-developed, partly carbonised epithecium. Supporting threads (paraphyses) are only about 1 μm wide, run close together and branch laterally into a delicate network. Each broadly club-shaped (clavate ascus contains two to six colourless, thick-walled spores. …

The holotype grew on tree bark at about 2000 m elevation in the eastern Himalaya, and additional specimens extend the range southward to the Sikkim Himalaya (Tonglo, 1800–2100 m elevation) and westward to the moist evergreen forests of the Western Ghats (Amboli, roughly 1050 m). Across this latitudinal span the species occupies humid montane or submontane rainforest where frequent mists, moderate light and constant air movement create a damp but aerated microclimate on smooth bark. At the time of its original publication, D. megasporum was regarded as an Indian endemic restricted to well-watered mid-elevation forests in both the eastern and western mountain chains. It was later identified from China, indicating a broader pantropical distribution. It is one of ten Diorygma species that have been recorded in China.

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