Frullania pran-nathii - a New Epiphyllous Liverwort from Darjeeling, India

Abstract

A new species of genus Frullania Raddi, F. pran-nathii M. Dey & D. K. Singh is described from Darjeeling in the Eastern Himalaya, India. It is characterized by greenish brown plants with small, thick-walled cortical cells arranged in a single layer and thin-walled medullary cells with minute tri-radiate trigones; widely spreading, contiguous to distant, suborbicular to elliptical leaves with plane lobe, a large auriculate appendage at base and flat apex; median leaf cells with small trigones and nodular intermediate thickenings; basal leaf cells with trabeculately thickened trigones and intermediate thickenings; stylus multicellular at base with 1-3 teeth lateral tooth and 5-7 cells uniseriate towards apex terminating into an elongated hyaline cell, and 1/8-1/5 bilobed, distant underleaves with auriculate base. The species has been compared with F. nepalensis (Spreng.) Lehm. & Lindenb., from which it differs in the shape and arrangement of leaves, and size and structure of stylus.