Hesperomyces harmoniae, a new name for a common ectoparasitic fungus on the invasive alien ladybird Harmonia axyridis
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Fungi in the order Laboulbeniales (Ascomycota, Laboulbeniomycetes) are obligate, microscopic ectoparasites of arthropods. These fungi, unlike their close relatives, never form hyphae. Instead, they produce a three-dimensional thallus that consists of several hundred to a thousand vegetative cells derived from a two-celled ascospore by determinate mitotic divisions. Of 2,325 described species, 80 % are known from beetles (Coleoptera). Hesperomyces is a genus of 11 species associated with ladybirds (Coleoptera, Coccinellidae) and false skin beetles (Biphyllidae). One species, Hesperomyces virescens, is known from all continents except Australia and Antarctica, and has been reported on 30 ladybird hosts in 20 genera. Previous work, based on geometric morphometrics, molecular phylogeny, sequence-based species delimitation methods, and host information, pointed out that He. virescens is a complex of multiple species segregated by host. Here, we formally describe the most recorded species in the complex, Hesperomyces harmoniae-parasite of the harlequin ladybird Harmonia axyridis, a globally invasive species. Using DNA isolates of Hesperomyces from multiple host species, including the host on which He. virescens was originally described (Chilocorus stigma), we found that He. harmoniae forms a single clade in our phylogenetic reconstruction of a two-locus riboso-mal dataset. Hesperomyces harmoniae is currently known from five continents and 31 countries: Canada, El Salvador, Mexico, the USA (North America); Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador (South America); Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Luxembourg, Montenegro, The Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Switzerland, the UK (Europe); South Africa (Africa); China, Japan, and Turkey (Asia).
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".