Nash, T.H., Ryan, B.D., Gries, C., Bungartz, F., (eds.) 2007. Lichen Flora of the Greater Sonoran Desert Region. Vol 3.

Life habit: lichenized Thallus: crustose, with little stratification, ecorticate or partly corticated, without a rim or with a poorly developed one, 1-2 cm wide, attached by medullary hyphae; prothallus: dark gray or brown or black surface: usually gray, but sometimes whitish, brownish or greenish gray, dull, very uneven, rarely granular or with weakly developed areoles photobiont: primary one a Trebouxia, secondary one absent medulla: wooly Ascomata: apothecial, usually common, mostly 0.5-1(-2) mm wide, at first immersed, later constricted and sessile disc: red-brown to brownish black to black, round, concave or plane, usually without pruina; margin: thalloid only, corticate, concolorous with thallus, prominent exciple: hyaline to gray, with hyphae 4-6 µm wide in K epihymenium: red-brown to yellow-brown, 10-25 µm thick hymenium: gelatinous, often filled with oil droplets; paraphyses: free, unbranched or a little branched at the tips, 1-2 µm wide, occasionally septate; hypothecium: hyaline or pale gray, sometimes well developed, overlying an algal layer asci: clavate-globular, unitunicate, thin walled, I+ pale blue; tholus: I+ pale blue or with I+ blue cap, 32- to 200-spored ascospores: hyaline, globose or ellipsoid, simple (but sometimes appearing 1-septate), 4-12 x 2-6 µm; wall: thin, smooth, hyaline Conidiomata: pycnidial, infrequent, immersed in projections, acrogenous conidia: hyaline, oblong, cylindrical to filiform Secondary metabolites: none detected Geography: mainly lowland tropical or subtropical, but with one species extending into temperate regions and another up to c. 3000 m in southern China Substrate: on smooth bark. Notes: Based on its polysporous asci, it was initially treated as part of the Acarosporaceae by Magnusson (1934), but more recently it has been treated in the Fuscideaceae (Tehler 1996; Kantvilas 2001). At least some species may superficially look like Tephromela atra.