Malme, GO A:N 1932. Lichenes Orae Sibiriae Borealis: Inde ab Insula Minin usque ad Promontorium Ryrkajpia in Expeditione Vegae Lecti. Arkiv For Botanik. 25A: 22.

Thallus squamulose, dark reddish-brown, squamules dispersed, 0.5-1.2 (-1.5) mm wide, 0.5-0.8 mm thick, rounded, convex or subverrucose, smooth or subrugulose, often minutely shiny, unchanged with reagents, tightly adnate to rock, dark below.  Apothecia singular or in larger squamules, few or rarely many (to 9), immersed, disc punctiform, impressed or slightly expanded (to 0.3 mm), concolourous with thallus or black.

Upper cortex unevenly thick, 25-40(60) µ thick, hyaline, C-, dark brown to upper surface (6-8 µ), covered by unequal amorphous layer to 35 µ.  Cortex lumina diameter 1.5-2 u, pachydermatous.  Gonidia diameter 8-12 µ, gonidial layer circ. 70-135 µ thick, continuous.  Medulla hyaline, translucent, +/- thick, hyphae subleptodermatous, 2-3 µ thick, loosely entangled, lumen cylindrical, 0.5-0.8 µ thick.  Lateral cortex in inferior cortex +/- for a long time visibly crossing, both +/- dark yellow-brown.

Excipulum in center of apothecia circ. 35 µ thick, distinct, expanded laterally, to upper surface 35-85 µ thick and dark brown, cells round, diameter 2-2.5 µ iodine dark blue.  Hypothecium  30-50 µ thick, opaque.  Hymenium 100-115 (-160) µ tall, hyaline, dark yellow-brown to upper surface, 20-25 µ thick, rugulose above, iodine with hypothecium dark blue.  Paraphyses +/- separate, circ. 1.7 µ thick, apices coherent, brown, 3.5-4 µ thick.  Asci 70-90(-100) X 15-19 µ, clavate.  Spores very numerous, ellipsoid, 3.5-5 X 1.7-2 µ, hyaline, simple.  Ryrkajpia, one with Gyrophora proboscidea, Caloplaca elegante etc.

Habit and structure A. dispersa  H. MAGN (Monogr. Acarosp., p. 154), somewhat similar, but dark color, cortical cells large and paraphyses thick, receding.