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Summary list of algae of the Russian part of continental shelf of the Sea of Japan, compiled with data from the author and other researchers, includes 321 species. Among them, there are 62 Chlorophyta species, 86 Ochrophyta and 173 Rhodophyta. In the northern part of study area, 264 species were registered while in the southern area, including the Peter the Great Bay, 273 species were found. The species shared between both areas include 67 % of the checklist (216 species). Red algae Ahnfeltia fastigiata (Endlicher) Makienko and green algae Ulvella geniculata (N.L.Gardner) Nielsen, O’Kelly et Wysor are new records to the Russian mainland coast of the Sea of Japan. The checklist will be valuable for future studies on macroalgal biogeography and evaluation the influence of different natural and anthropogenic factors on biodiversity.

Low levels of diversity and endemism, when compared to red or brown algae, have been reported for Antarctic green marine macroalgae (Chlorophyta). However, recent studies including the use of molecular markers have allowed us to revisit the taxonomical status of species thought to be well known, underlying the existence of unexpected Antarctic flora diversity at local and regional scale. In the present study, samples of green macroalgae along the Western Antarctic Peninsula (from the 62°S down to the 66°S) were sequenced for two genetic markers regularly used for species determination and barcoding in Chlorophyta (i.e., the plastid genes tufA and rbcL). From the 122 specimens of Chlorophyta sampled, 85 were sequenced for the gene tufA and 16 for the gene rbcL. Using the NCBI Nucleotide Blast Tool to compare our sequences to the ones available in public data depositories allowed the identification of 11 species. Three new species were reported for the area: Rosenvingiella radicans (Kutz.) Rindi, L.McIvor & Guiry, Urospora wormskioldii (Mertens) Rosenvinge and Ulvella islandica R.Nielsen & K.Gunnarsson. Furthermore, molecular identification revealed strong match (> 95%) between our Antarctic sequences and the ones obtained for samples from the northern hemisphere for Acrosiphonia arcta (Dillwyn) Gain, Prasiola crispa (Lightfoot) Kutzing, Prasiola antarctica Kutzing 1849, R. radicans, Ulva sp. A-GW, U. islandica, Urospora penicilliformis (Roth) Areschoug and U. wormskioldii confirming the amphipolar distribution of various taxa of Antarctic Trebouxiophyceae and Ulvophyceae. Amphipolar distribution seems more common in green than red or brown Antarctic seaweeds, so here we hypothesize that recurrent occurrence of long dispersal events could explain the low level of endemism observed for this phylum along the Antarctic coasts.

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A new freshwater species of Ulvella, Ulvella tongshanensis H. ZHU et G. LIU, is described from material collected from rocks under small waterfalls in Hubei Province, China. This unusual species differs from other species in the genus by the macroscopic and upright parenchymatous thalli, and by the particular habitat (most Ulvella species occur in marine environments). Phylogenetic analyses of plastid encoded rbcL and tufA, and nuclear 18S rDNA sequences, pointed towards the generic placement of Ulvella tongshanensis and also showed a close relationship with two other freshwater species, Ulvella bullata (Jao) H. ZHU et G. LIU, comb. nov. and Ulvella prasina (Jao) H. ZHU et G. LIU, comb. nov. The latter two were previously placed in the genus Jaoa and are characterized by disc-shaped to vesicular morphology. Our study once again shows that traditionally used morphological characters are poor indicators for phylogenetic relatedness in morphologically simple algae like the Ulvellaceae. Thus, the morphological circumscription of the genus Ulvella is here expanded to include: (1) thalli that are uniseriate in basal and apical parts, and parenchymatous in the middle portion with distinct differentiation of an unbranched dorsal side and a ventral side developing many short branches, and (2) epibiotic or epilithic, disc-shaped to vesicular thalli with a di- or tristromatic structure.

Promises and perils of DNA barcoding are now well-known, but no studies have revealed the extent of taxonomic misidentification of algal specimens available in primary DNA sequence repositories. Our original objective was to assess the molecular identity of the ubiquitous brown alga Turbinaria ornata (Sargassaceae:, Fucales) from the southeast Indian coast. We extracted total genomic DNA from freshly collected algal thalli and sequenced the nuclear ribosomal DNA Internal Transcribed Spacer-1 (nrDNA ITS1) barcode locus. Following a BLASTn DNA sequence similarity search, the identity of our alga was Laurencia thyrsifera, a Pacific red alga that has never been reported in India, which came as a big surprise. Further analyses of BLAST hits using a robust phylogenetic framework of Bayesian Inference led to the conclusion that our sequence belonged to an epiphytic Ulvellacean green algal genus Ulvella, which might have been extracted and amplified with our universal ITS primers. This is the first report for Ulv...

The present study investigates the epiphytic communities on individuals of a population of the brown macroalga Dictyota dichotoma, from Las Grutas beach (40◦82 S, 65◦09 W), growing on the Patagonian coast, Río Negro Province, Argentina. The composition and spatial and temporal variability were investigated during an annual cycle, to relate the seasonal variations of vegetative and reproductive characteristics of the thallus with the richness, diversity and evenness of the epiphytic community, and their relationship with daylength and seawater temperatures. The epiphytic community consisted of 32 differenttaxa. The most abundant epiphytic groups were Chlorophyceae, Bacillariophyceae and Cyanophyceae. Only a few epiphytes were present throughout the year. Epiphytic richness and abundance were highest in the middle and basal host regions. The high basal abundance was accounted for by four epiphytic species:Microchaete aeruginea, Pylaiella tenella, Ulvella marchantiae andAudouinella secundata. Seasonally, the epiphytic load was highest in winter, and largely accounted for by Grammatophora marina, Cocconeis sp. and P. tenella. The epiphytic load did not show variation among the different host reproductive stages, and no relationship was observed between thallus host length and dry mass. Fil: Gauna, Maria Cecilia. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía; Argentina Fil: Caceres, Eduardo Jorge. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Departamento de Biología, Bioquímica y Farmacia; Argentina Fil: Parodi, Elisa Rosalia. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Bahía Blanca. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía. Universidad Nacional del Sur. Instituto Argentino de Oceanografía; Argentina. Universidad Nacional del Sur; Argentina

Epi-endophytic green algae comprise one of the most diverse and phylogenetically primitive groups of green algae and are considered to be ubiquitous in the world’s oceans; however, no reports of these algae exist from India. Here we report the serendipitous discovery of Ulvella growing on intertidal green algae Cladophora glomerata and benthic red algae Laurencia obtusa collected from India. DNA barcodes at nuclear ribosomal DNA Internal Transcriber Spacer (nrDNA ITS) 1 and 2 regions for Indian isolates from the west and east coasts have been generated for the first time. Based on morphology and DNA barcoding, isolates were identified as Ulvella leptochaete. Phylogenetic reconstruction of concatenated dataset using Maximum Likelihood method differentiated Indian isolates from other accessions of this alga available in Genbank, albeit with low bootstrap support. Monophyly of Ulvella leptochaete was obvious in both of our phylogenetic analyses. With this first report of epi-endophytic algae from Indian territorial waters, the dire need to catalogue its cryptic diversity is highlighted and avenues of future research are discussed. [Bast F, Bhushan S and John AA 2014 DNA barcoding of a new record of epi-endophytic green algae Ulvella leptochaete (Ulvellaceae, Chlorophyta) in India. J. Biosci. 39 711–716] DOI 10.1007/s12038-014-9459-3

The growth, reproduction, gametophyte(G)/tetrasporophyte(T) ratio, and diseases of Chondrus ocellatus populations were examined at 3 sites (Samcheok, Youngduk, Pohang) of East coast and at 2 sites (Hakampo, Manripo) of West coast in between July and August, 2013. Average plant lengths were 6.10~9.69 cm and it was minimum at Manripo and maximum at Pohang population. In general, average plant length and weight of C. ocellatus were greater on East coast than West coast populations. The proportion of vegetative plant was between 26.7~66.7 %, and G/T ratio of total plants including vegetative plants after testing resorcinol method was 3:2 on the East coast where is gametophyte dominant area. However, G/T ratio was 1:1 at Hakampo and 1:2.3 at Manripo representing tetrasporophyte dominance. In the present study, Korean C. ocellatus have various diseases (white colour and green colour), an endophytic alga(Ulvella sp.), and many epiphytic macroalgae and diatoms. Healthy C. ocellatus plants were about 20~40 % in summer population and most of plants had disease. Chondrus ocellatus had a filamentous green alga, endophytic Ulvella sp. which was not identified. The endophyte is easily observed in C. crispus growing in Europe and Canada and it is recognised as a pathogen destroying population and reducing yield of C. crispus. Thus more interest and research on the endophytic algae and disease of C. ocellatus are required.

A new freshwater alga species of Ulvella shanxiensis , is found in the circulating neutral water spring in China (Shanxi Province), growing epilithic and epiphytic on other substrates. This new species is characterized by olive-green, disc-shaped hollow thallus with irregularly vesicular morphology, which composed of 2–3 layers cells. Most characteristics were in agreement with Ulvella , but distinguished from the other freshwater members by thalli dimensions and cell diameter. In addition to describing the morphological structures of U. shanxiensis in detail, phylogenetic analysis based on sequences of the rbc L and 18S rDNA gene placed the algae in single clade with two samples, and demonstrated the separation between U. shanxiensis and other Ulvella species with a considerable sequence distance. Comparing with U. bullata , the internal transcribed spacer secondary structure of the new species has some compensatory base changes in 1 Helix and hemi-CBCs in 2–3 Helix, differed in several ways from that of other Ulvella algae. Consequently, these results of morphological observation and phylogenetic analysis suggest this alga as a new species, and bring a new record in the total number of recognized freshwater Ulvella species in China.

In re-assessing the genus Pringsheimiella, seven species are referred to this taxon. These are: P. scutata (Reinke) Marchewianka, the type species of the genus; P. gratulans (Weber-van Bosse) Nielsen & McLachlan comb. nov, renamed from Ochlo-chaete gratulans Weber-van Bosse; P. udoteae (Borgesen) Schmidt & Petrak; P. con-chyliophila Feldmann; P. crenulata (Lami) Nielsen & McLachlan comb. nov., renamed from Ulvella crenulata Lami; P. mauritiana Borgesen, which may be synonymous with P. crenulata but requires further study; and P. sanctae-luciae sp. nov.

Very close similarities between the fossil genera Callimothallus Dilcher, 1965 and Microthallites Dilcher, 1965 and recent representatives of the green algae Ulvella P. L. & H. M. Crouan, 1859, seem to rule out the assumption that fossil, disciform and radiate palynomorph microfossils are representatives of microthyrioaceous fungi. On the basis of the morphology of fossil Ulvella, a model of the general morpohlogy of encrusting, palynomorph algae is constructed. The model includes 5 morphological characters that may only be applied to encrusting life-forms and in particular not to planktonic algae. These characters, therefore, in future palynological research may serve to distinguish benthic algae from planktonic algae. A new fossil alga, Ulvella nannae sp. nov. is described.

The life histories of Ulvella lens and U. setchellii were studied in culture. Both species have quadriflagellate zoospores. This means that there is no remaining difference between Ulvella and Pseudulvella. Plants grown in sea water without any additions developed hairs. It is suggested that Ochlochaete lentiformis is a later synonym of Ulvella lens.

N stones and other submerged objects on the bed of almost any shallow stream there can be found a large number of algae. A brief description of such growths studied by means of submerged glass slides was given by Butcher, Pentelow and Woodley(4) in an account of the investigations on the River Lark. Though the growths on the slides in the spring consist of well-known diatoms, the summer growths comprise for the most part rare and little-known algaechiefly members of the Chaetophoraceae and Chamaesiphonaceae, and it is amongst these that a number of rare or hitherto unknown species have been encountered. Similar growths have already been described by Geitler (6) and Fritsch (5), and to the accounts published by them the present paper adds further knowledge of these forms by the description of the following species: Sporotetras pyriformis sp. et gen.nov. Sphaerobotrys fluviatilis sp. et gen.nov. Ulvella frequens sp.nov. Stigeoclonium falklandicum Kfitzing(9), var.nov. anglicum. Stigeoclonium farctum Berthold (2), var.nov. rivulare. Gongrosira incrustans (Reinsch(11)), Schmidle(13). Chaetopeltis megalocystis Schmidle (12). It is possible that some of the new forms are juvenile stages, but in spite of prolonged search no indication of further development has been found. Since the forms in question are among the commonest of the algae on a river bed and play an important part in the biology of the river, it is necessary to assign a name to them and so there seems to be no alternative to describing them as new.