PSEUDONEOCHLORIS MARINA (CHLOROPHYTA), A NEW COCCOID ULVOPHYCEAN ALGA, AND ITS PHYLOGENETIC POSITION INFERRED FROM MORPHOLOGICAL AND MOLECULAR DATA

Ultrastructural and molecular sequence data were used to assess the phylogenetic position of the coccoid green alga deposited in the culture collection of the University of Texas at Austin under the name of Neochloris sp. (1445). This alga has uninucleate vegetative cells and a parietal chloroplast with pyrenoids; it reproduces by forming naked biflagellate zoospores. Electron microscopy revealed that zoospores have basal bodies displaced in the counterclockwise absolute orientation and overlapped at their proximal ends. Four microtubular rootlets numbering 2 and 2/1 are alternatively arranged in a cruciate pattern. A system I fiber extends beneath each d rootlet and a system II fiber (rhizoplast) originates from each basal body and extends peripherally along each d rootlet. These features differ substantially from those of the three genera, Ettlia (Komárek) Deason et al., Neochloris (Starr) Deason et al., and Parietochloris Watanabe et Floyd, all of which were previously accommodated in the single genus Neochloris Starr. Sequence data from the nuclear small subunit ribosomal RNA gene were obtained and compared with published green algal sequences. Results from the ultrastructural and sequence data support the placement of Neochloris sp. (The Culture Collection of Algae at the University of Texas at Austin [UTEX] no. 1445) in the Ulvophyceae. This isolate is described as Pseudoneochloris marina , gen. et sp. nov. in the Ulotrichales, Ulvophyceae.