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Fungi have mini water cannons that fire spores

2017; Elsevier BV; Volume: 235; Issue: 3137 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1016/s0262-4079(17)31497-5

2059-5387

Leah Crane,

Slime Mold and Myxomycetes Research

Some fungi have a special talent: they shoot out their spores at high speed. Traveling just a centimeter away from the fungus is enough for the spores to catch the breeze and disperse, but exactly how fungi eject them has been a mystery for a century. Spore launching is responsible for reproduction in tens of thousands of species--about one-third of the fungal kingdom, says Chuan-Hua Chen at Duke University in North Carolina, whose team has observed a cannon-like aspect to the process. Using an inkjet printer, they built up a pair of droplets on a 200-micrometer-long styrofoam and watched with a high-speed camera. When the droplets merged, energy spread down the length of the new drop on the flat side of the spore. This is like a cannon, with a spore as the cannonball, says Chen. The Buller's drop is like the ammunition.