Cora applanata is a species of basidiolichen in the family Hygrophoraceae. It was formally described as a new species in 2016 by Bibiana Moncada, Edier Soto-Medina, and Robert Lücking. The specific epithet refers to its (flattened) thallus. The lichen is widely distributed in tropical montane areas of the northern Andes, where it grows on soil along open road banks and on land slides.
Cora applanata is a basidiolichen in the family Hygrophoraceae (order Agaricales). It was formally described in 2016 by Bibiana Moncada, Edier Soto-Medina, and Robert Lücking on the basis of material collected in the Western Cordillera of Colombia. The specific epithet, applanata, refers to the characteristically flattened, ground-hugging thallus. Internal transcribed spacer rDNA sequences from the type and numerous paratypes place the species in the Cora reticulifera clade, a group of soil-dwelling taxa with completely lobes and a hymenophore. Within this clade, C. applanata is the northern-Andean representative; its closest relatives occur further south in Bolivia and south-eastern Brazil.
The lichen forms a foliose (leaf-like) rosette firmly attached to bare soil (terricolous and adnate). A single thallus may reach about 10 cm across, yet many thalli often coalesce to carpet large patches of roadside banks or landslides. Each thallus is composed of three to seven semicircular lobes, 1âÂÂ2 cm wide and long. When fresh the upper surface is olive-green to dark olive-grey and almost flat; on drying it quickly develops striking concentric colour rings that remain visible in the herbarium. The thin, rolled-in () lobe margins are whitish and usually , though minute may occur. The lower surface lacks a protective outer skin () and instead shows the felt-like medulla, initially grey and turning whitish-grey once dried.
In cross-section the thallus is 150âÂÂ200 micrometres (üm) thick, with a compact upper (10âÂÂ20 üm), a packed with green algal cells (70âÂÂ130 üm), and a hydrophobic medulla (30âÂÂ50 üm). The partner is of the Rhizonema interruptum lineage. No clamp connections or papillate hyphae have been observed. The fertile surface (hymenophore) develops as cream-coloured, resupinate patches 0.3âÂÂ1 mm wide that often fuse into irregular, faintly concentric lines. Sections reveal a hymenium 80âÂÂ100 üm thick containing abundant basidioles (20âÂÂ25 à4âÂÂ6 üm) and scattered 4-spored basidia (25âÂÂ35 à4âÂÂ6 üm); basidiospores have not been seen. Thin-layer chromatography detects no secondary metabolites.
Cora applanata is widespread in the northern Andes of Colombia and Ecuador, with confirmed records from the Sierra de Carchi in the north to the Cordillera Oriental of Cundinamarca and the cloud forests of Azuay in the south. It occupies tropical-montane and páramo zones between roughly 1,300 and 3,700 m elevation. The lichen favours disturbed, fully exposed habitatsâÂÂparticularly open road verges, landslides, and other soil banksâÂÂwhere its flattened form sits flush with the substrate and withstands alternating wet and rapidly drying conditions. After rainfall the thallus dries within minutes, leaving the concentric rings visible even under humid skies, a feature that likely mitigates prolonged saturation and promotes gas exchange in these high-moisture environments.