Stanjemonium grisellum by Derek Johnson

Stanjemonium grisellum W. Gams, Schroers & M. Chr. (Hypocreales, Bionectriaceae) is a saprotrophic filamentous fungus isolated from grassland soil. Bionectriaceae is a poorly understood family of fungi for which no genomes have been sequenced, and although it have been hypothesized as one of the earlier diverging lineages of the Hypocreales, robust support for its phylogenetic relationship to other families of the order (e.g., Nectriaceae, Hypocreaceae, etc.) has not been firmly established. Lineages in Hypocreales have undergone major nutritional shifts between saprotrophy, endophytism, and plant and animal pathogenicity, but the order and patterns of these ecological and nutritional transitions remains unclear due to the unresolved phylogenetic relationships of the early diverging clades. Sequencing the genome of S. grisellum will allow a genome scale phylogeny to clarify these transitions and allow deeper examinations of CAZyme and protease diversification and evolution as a response to nutritional and host shifts.