- Reference
- Sp.Alg. 416 (1849)
- Conservation Code
- Not threatened
- Naturalised Status
- Native to Western Australia
- Name Status
- Current
Scientific Description
Habit and structure. Thallus medium green, forming prostrate mats to 10 mm thick, composed of interwoven sparingly to densely branched filaments, loosely attached to the substratum by branched or unbranched, uni- or multicellular rhizoids arising from the basal poles of cells, and by hapteroid structures produced by apical cells. Growth by transverse division of apical cells and by intercalary cell divisions. Apices slightly acropetal to irregular; lateral branches arising 1 (rarely 2) per cell, almost perpendicular to the bearing filament, initially without cross-walls at their base but later with cross-walls steeply inclined to the parent cell; with occasional rhizoids from the basal poles of the cells. Filaments sometimes connected by hapteroid holdfasts formed at the apices of lateral branches or rhizoids. Apical cells cylindrical, with rounded tips, 25–50 μm diam. [L:B 10–40]; cells of terminal branches cylindrical, 35–55 μm diam. [L:B 3–20]; basal cells cylindrical, 60–120 μm diam. [L:B 3–5]. Cell walls c. 1 μm thick in apical cells, to 8 μm thick in basal cells.
Distribution. Widely distributed in tropical to warm-temperate regions of the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans.
[After Huisman & Leliaert, Algae of Australia: Mar. Benthic Algae of North-western Australia, 1. Green and Brown Algae 56 (2015)]