Arthur Fungarium (PUR)​

Fungarium Overview

The Rust Fungi

Important Collections​

​​Specimen Digitization​

​

Indiana Rust Fungi​

Of the approximately 110,000 specimens in the Arthur Fungarium, most have been accessioned, and ca. 97,000 have been cataloged. Statistical data provided herein is based only on the cataloged specimen​s. Of these, there are over 5,000 rust species represented in the Arthur Herbarium of which roughly 70% are represented by more than one specimen, with 30% having more than 10 specimens and 5% more than 100. The collection has representative specimens for all 14 rust fungi families (fide Cummins and Hiratsuka 2003) and for 132 genera (of an estimated 168 total). The genus Puccinia is the most extensively represented in the collection and there are specimens for 1480 Puccinia species. This is to be expected as more than half of the known rust species belong to this genus (Cummins and Hiratsuka 2003), which contains, for instance the world’s major cereal pathogens such as P. recondita, P. graminis and P. coronata. The number of specimens in each family along with the genera and species with the greatest representation are provided in Table 1.

There are close to 4,000 specimens noted as being of type status in the cataloged Arthur Fungarium collection. As part of the Global Plants Initiative​, we are currently verifying the data and status for these and imaging the entire type collection​, which will be completed by the end of 2014. In mid-August 2013, a large loan of ca. 20,000 specimens was returned to the Arthur Fungarium. Although the specimens in this loan have not been databased, it is estimated that they contain an additional 500–800 types and will add representatives of nearly every rust genus, including monotypic ones, to the material in the Arthur.

In addition to the collection of valuable type specimens, the Arthur Fungarium serves as a source of additional information about the temporal and spatial distribution not only of Pucciniales species but also of their host plants. In fact, recent studies have found a tertiary level of specimen data associated with Pucciniales collections in examining the distribution and specificity of fly larvae (genus Mycodiplosis) that are rust fungivores with potential as biological control agents and are often accidentally preserved in herbarium collections along with their hosts (Henk et al. 2011; Nelsen 2012). Specimens in the Arthur have been collected from 187 countries, with the majority from North America and roughly half (ca. 53,000 specimens) from the USA. The ten countries with the largest representation of species in the cataloged collection are listed in Table 2.

In addition to its obvious scientific value, the Arthur Fungarium is of great historical interest. With over half of the specimens collected from North America, this collection creates an informative timeline of the rust fungi and their host plants in North America from the early 1800s to present. Roughly 63% of the cataloged rust collections in the Arthur Herbarium predate 1929 and over 12,000 specimens were collected from the 1800’s. One specimen dates back to 1769 and was collected by Sir Joseph Banks in Tierra del Fuego, South America, during Captain James Cook's first voyage around the world (McCain and Hennen 1993).

References

• Cummins GB, Hiratsuka Y. 2003. Genera of Rust Fungi. APS Press, St. Paul, Minnesota. 225 pp.
• Henk DA, Farr DF, Aime MC. 2011. Mycodiplosis infestation of rust fungi is frequent, wide spread and possibly host specific. Fungal Ecology 4:284–289. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1754504811000390
• McCain JW, Hennen JF. 1993. The Arthur Herbarium Centennial: 100 Years of Uredinology in Indiana and the Great Lakes Region. Proceedings of the Indiana Academy of Science, 9: 389–395. http://journals.iupui.edu/index.php/ias/article/view/8115/8273​
• Nelsen DJ. 2013. A phylogenetic analysis of species diversity, specificity, and distribution of Mycodiplosis on rust fungi. M.S. Thesis: Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA. 158 pp. http://etd.lsu.edu/docs/available/etd-04042013-104148/​​​​​​​