46 



GYMNASCALES 



Order 6. GYMNASCALES 



Asci free or in simple prothecia, rarely in a sclerotioid ascoma, solitary or 

 grouped, globoid to saccate, occasionally elongate, 1-many-spored, paraphyses 

 lacking; mycelium well-developed and branched, with cross-walls, or reduced to a 

 few cells multiplying by budding or fission, occasionally developing sex-organs, 

 sometimes massed to form a prothecium, often with appendage-like branches, or 

 a solid sclerotium-like ascoma. 



The chief bond in this order is the free ascus or ascus-group, without protective 

 hyphae or these limited to a loose or dense mass termed a prothecium. It serves 

 as the connecting link between the Phycomycetes and the Ascomycetes proper. 

 In several genera it is practically impossible to determine whether the spore-body 

 is an ascus or a sporangium. The latter seems to be the case in Ascoidea and its 

 relatives, and these are in consequence referred to the first group. The Endomy- 

 cetaceae may be placed in either with almost equal warrant. The Gymnascaceae 

 lead directly into the Eurotiaceae on the one hand and the Myriangiaceae on the 

 other, no real dividing line being discernible in the latter case especially. While 

 the Saccharomycetaceae are regarded as reduced, it appears certain that this reduc- 

 tion has applied to primitive forms, and that this family has no connection with 

 the Agyriales, where reduction has operated upon the highly specialized apothecium. 



Key to Families 



A. Asci solitary, on or in mycelial threads, naked 



or without an individual hyphal wall 



1. Asci naked 



a. Asci terminal or lateral on a branched septate 



mycelium 



b. Asci intercalary or continuous in a short bud- 



ding mycelium 



2. Asci with an individual hyphal wall, terminal 



on the branches of a septate mycelium 



B. Asci in masses, enclosed by a loose hyphal 



peridium, the latter sometimes sclerotioid 



Endomycetaceae p. 46 

 Saccharomycetaceae p. 47 

 Monascaceae p. 48 

 Gymnascaceae p. 48 



Family 15. ENDOMYCETACEAE 

 22:767, 24:1304; Schroeter 154 



Mycelium typically well developed, branched and septate, rarely scanty, fre- 

 quently with terminal 1-celled conidia; asci single, without hyphal envelop, terminal 

 or lateral, rarely intercalary, 1-8-spored, occasionally many-spored; spores 1-celled 

 and hyaline or nearly so. 



A. Mycelium saprogenous 



1. Asci 1-2-spored 



2. Asci 8-spored 



a. Asci formed from the spirally wound tips of 



two branches; spores globose 



b. Asci formed directly from a single hypha 



(1) Asci 4-spored, terminal 



(2) Asci 8-spored 

 (a) Asci terminal or lateral, not intercalary 



X, Asci conglomerate; spores ovoid, not 



conglobate 

 y. Asci not conglomerate; spores globose, 



conglobate 



Bargellinia 8:823 



Eremascus 8:822 

 Endyllium 



Byssochlamys 22:596 

 Oleinis 8:822 



