Recently, I noticed three seemingly unconnected articles about fungi. The main connection between these articles appears to be the lethality of fungi. Latter might be remarkable because Alexander Fleming discovered the medical healing power of penicillium, another fungus, during World War 1.
Fungi are well-known in food (mushrooms), for recreational use (magic mushrooms), and for their toxic abilities. Yeast is another fungus. Wiki: “By fermentation, the yeast species Saccharomyces cerevisiae converts carbohydrates to carbon dioxide and alcohols – for thousands of years the carbon dioxide has been used in baking and the alcohol in alcoholic beverages”.
The lethality of fungi appears in several quite recent articles:
- By mid 2018, scientists had finally figured out what caused the sharp global decline of frogs, toads, and salamanders. Much to their surprise, the culprit was a lethal fungal infection by an “ancient skin-eating fungus”, called chytridiomycosis. Sources: NewScientist 2013-10, Atlantic 2018-05, NatGeo 2018-05, Phys 2019-01, New Scientist 2019-03.
- On 6 April 2019, the New York Times published a Breaking News Alert on another fungus: “A Mysterious Infection, Spanning the Globe in a Climate of Secrecy. The rise of Candida auris embodies a serious and growing public health threat: drug-resistant germs.”
NYT: “Candida auris, a deadly fungus, preys on people with weakened immune systems and confuses doctors. It is spreading quietly across the globe, in Venezuela, Spain, Britain, India, Pakistan, South Africa and the U.S.”
- On 8 April 2019, the Independent reported as follows: “The International Space Station is brimming with bacteria and fungi that can cause diseases and form biofilms that promote antibiotic resistance, and can even corrode the spacecraft, a new study has found.”
In Nature‘s Tree of Life, there are 3 domains: the single-cell domains of bacteria and archaea, and multi-cell organisms called eukaryota. Remarkably, fungi are actually quite close to animals and humans. Late 2018, a new domain (“neither animal, plant, fungus nor any recognized type of protozoan“) was discovered in the soil of Nova Scotia (Quanta Magazine).
Trends in Microbiology (2009): “Their simple morphologies and variable ecological strategies have confounded efforts to elucidate their limits, phylogenetic relationships, and diversity.”
“Fungi are the interface organisms between life and death”. A quote from the 2005 book Mycelium Running by Paul Stamets (b. 1955), an American mycologist.
Kaap’ren Varen (1973) by Fungus
artists, lyrics, video, Wiki-1, Wiki-2
Note: all markings (bold, italic, underlining) by LO unless stated otherwise
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