Overview
Taxonomy
The Subkingdom Dikarya is a member of the Kingdom Fungi. Here is the complete "parentage" of Dikarya:
The Subkingdom Dikarya is further organized into finer groupings including:
- Phylum (2): Ascomycota · Basidiomycota
Phyla
Ascomycota
The Ascomycota are a Division/Phylum of the kingdom Fungi, and subkingdom Dikarya. Its members are commonly known as the Sac fungi. They are the largest phylum of Fungi, with over 64,000 species. The defining feature of this fungal group is the "ascus" (from Greek: ?s??? (askos), meaning "sac" or "wineskin"), a microscopic sexual structure in which nonmotile spores, called ascospores, are formed. However, some species of the Ascomycota are asexual, meaning that they do not have a sexual cycle and thus do not form asci or ascospores. Previously placed in the Deuteromycota along with asexual species from other fungal taxa, asexual (or anamorphic) ascomycetes are now identified and classified based on morphological or physiological similarities to ascus-bearing taxa, and by phylogenetic analyses of DNA sequences. [more]
Basidiomycota
Basidiomycota () is one of two large phyla that, together with the Ascomycota, comprise the subkingdom Dikarya (often referred to as the "higher fungi") within the kingdom Fungi. More specifically the Basidiomycota include these groups: mushrooms, puffballs, stinkhorns, bracket fungi, other polypores, jelly fungi, boletes, chanterelles, earth stars, smuts, bunts, rusts, mirror yeasts, and the human pathogenic yeast Cryptococcus. Basically, Basidiomycota are filamentous fungi composed of hyphae (except for yeasts), and reproducing sexually via the formation of specialized club-shaped end cells called basidia that normally bear external meiospores (usually four). These specialized spores are called basidiospores. However, some Basidiomycota reproduce asexually in addition or exclusively. Basidiomycota that reproduce asexually (discussed below) can be recognized as members of this phylum by gross similarity to others, by the formation of a distinctive anatomical feature (the clamp connection - see below), cell wall components, and definitively by phylogenetic molecular analysis of DNA sequence data. [more]
At least 66,330 species and subspecies belong to the Phylum Basidiomycota.
More info about the Phylum Basidiomycota may be found here.
Sources
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