Emendation of Dioszegia with redescription of Dioszegia hungarica and two new combinations, Dioszegia aurantiaca and Dioszegia crocea

During phylogenetic analyses of hymenomycetous yeasts based on 18S rDNA seq uences, we found that Bullera armeniaca showed an extremely close phylogene tic relationship to Cryptococcus hungaricus. The analyses of internal trans cribed spacer (ITS) regions of the two yeasts and the phylogenetically rela ted species, Bullera aurantiaca and Bullera crocea, showed that B. armeniac a and C. hungaricus had identical sequences, indicating that these were con specific. B. aurantiaca and B. crocea also showed high sequence similarity, 97.1% for ITS1, 100% for ITS2, and 98.7% for overall ITS regions. A DNA-DN A reassociation experiment revealed that B. armeniaca and C. hungaricus wer e conspecific and B. aurantiaca and B. crocea were two distinct species. Th ese species occurred at a phylogenetically different lineage from that of B ulleromyces albus (anamorph: Bullera alba, type species of Bullera) and Fil obasidiella neoformans (anamorph: Cryptococcus neoformans, neotype species of Cryptococcus). Based on these results, we emend the genus Dioszegia to i nclude both ballistoconidium-forming and non-ballistoconidium-forming yeast s and redescribe the species Dioszegia hungarica. B. aurantiaca and B. croc ea are also transferred to Dioszegia as Dioszegia aurantiaca comb. nov. and Dioszegia crocea comb. nov.