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Fusarium avenaceum is a filamentous fungus commonly associated with plants and soil. It is a causal agent of Fusarium head blight (FHB) on maize and small-grain cereals and blights on other plant species, and is one of the very few fungal species known to have ice nucleation activity (i.e., it catalyzes ice formation). Here, we report the draft genome of the ice-nucleation-active F. avenaceum strain F156N33 isolated from the atmosphere above Virginia. The genome assembly is 41,175,306 bp long, consists of 214 contigs, and is predicted to encode 11,233 proteins, which were annotated using RNA-sequencing data obtained from the same strain. 

Abstract Fusarium oxysporum is a cross-kingdom fungal pathogen that infects plants and humans. Horizontally transferred lineage-specific (LS) chromosomes were reported to determine host-specific pathogenicity among phytopathogenic F. oxysporum . However, the existence and functional importance of LS chromosomes among human pathogenic isolates are unknown. Here we report four unique LS chromosomes in a human pathogenic strain NRRL 32931, isolated from a leukemia patient. These LS chromosomes were devoid of housekeeping genes, but were significantly enriched in genes encoding metal ion transporters and cation transporters. Homologs of NRRL 32931 LS genes, including a homolog of ceruloplasmin and the genes that contribute to the expansion of the alkaline pH-responsive transcription factor PacC/Rim1p, were also present in the genome of NRRL 47514, a strain associated with Fusarium keratitis outbreak. This study provides the first evidence, to our knowledge, for genomic compartmentalization in two human pathogenic fungal genomes and suggests an important role of LS chromosomes in niche adaptation. 

This article is to alert medical mycologists and infectious disease specialists of recent name changes of medically important species of the filamentous moldFusarium.Fusariumspecies can cause localized and life-threating infections in humans. Of the 70Fusariumspecies that have been reported to cause infections, close to one-third are members of theFusarium solanispecies complex (FSSC), and they collectively account for approximately two-thirds of all reportedFusariuminfections. 

Scientific communication is facilitated by a data-driven, scientifically sound taxonomy that considers the end-user's needs and established successful practice. Previously (Geiser et al. 2013; Phytopathology 103:400-408. 2013), the Fusarium community voiced near unanimous support for a concept of Fusarium that represented a clade comprising all agriculturally and clinically important Fusarium species, including the F. solani Species Complex (FSSC). Subsequently, this concept was challenged by one research group (Lombard et al. 2015 Studies in Mycology 80: 189-245) who proposed dividing Fusarium into seven genera, including the FSSC as the genus Neocosmospora, with subsequent justification based on claims that the Geiser et al. (2013) concept of Fusarium is polyphyletic (Sandoval-Denis et al. 2018; Persoonia 41:109-129). Here we test this claim, and provide a phylogeny based on exonic nucleotide sequences of 19 orthologous protein-coding genes that strongly support the monophyly of Fusarium including the FSSC. We reassert the practical and scientific argument in support of a Fusarium that includes the FSSC and several other basal lineages, consistent with the longstanding use of this name among plant pathologists, medical mycologists, quarantine officials, regulatory agencies, students and researchers with a stake in its taxonomy. In recognition of this monophyly, 40 species recently described as Neocosmospora were recombined in Fusarium, and nine others were renamed Fusarium. Here the global Fusarium community voices strong support for the inclusion of the FSSC in Fusarium, as it remains the best scientific, nomenclatural and practical taxonomic option available.