Identification of some Lecidea, Porpidia and Lecidella species (lichen-forming ascomycetes) distributed in Turkey by sequence analysis of rDNA ITS region

The taxonomy of Lecidea is extremely complex because of the enormous morphological variation within and between species. The aim of this study was to analyse the rDNA (ITS) regions of Lecidea species and related genus called Lecidella and Porpidia which are widely spreaded in Anatolia, Turkey. Methods: The ITS rDNA sequence information of 17 samples from 11 species which were collected from different provinces of Anatolia were generated. Some of the specimens from Lecidea, Lecidella, Lecanora and Porpidia genus were also taken from the GenBank (www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov). The phylogenetic analysis was performed by the help of four different methods (NJ, ME, MP, UPGMA) and these different methods manifested similar results. Results: Minimum-Evolution (ME) dendrogram revealed that species of Lecidea, Lecidella, Porpidia and Ganoderma sp. genus were distributed into four main branches. Ganoderma applanatum (GU256764) which was considered as outgroup formed one of the branches, while the other species were collected on the other branchs. Generally the species which belong to the same genus, combined in one branch towards to the origin. In accordance with the results derived from