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Sclerotia
A sclerotium (; (), is a compact mass of hardened fungal mycelium containing food reserves. One role of sclerotia is to survive environmental extremes. In some higher fungi such as ergot, sclerotia become detached and remain dormant until favorable growth conditions return. Sclerotia initially were mistaken for individual organisms and described as separate species until Louis René Tulasne proved in 1853 that sclerotia are only a stage in the life cycle of some fungi. Further investigation showed that this stage appears in many fungi belonging to many diverse groups. Sclerotia are important in the understanding of the life cycle and reproduction of fungi, as a food source, as medicine (for example, ergotamine), and in agricultural blight management. Examples of fungi that form sclerotia are ergot (''Claviceps purpurea''), ''Polyporus tuberaster'', ''Psilocybe mexicana'', ''Sclerotium delphinii'' and many species in Sclerotiniaceae. Although not fungal, the plasmodium (life cycl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ergot
Ergot ( ) or ergot fungi refers to a group of fungi of the genus ''Claviceps''. The most prominent member of this group is ''Claviceps purpurea'' ("rye ergot fungus"). This fungus grows on rye and related plants, and produces alkaloids that can cause ergotism in humans and other mammals who consume grains contaminated with its fruiting structure (called ''ergot sclerotium''). ''Claviceps'' includes about 50 known species, mostly in the tropical regions. Economically significant species include ''C. purpurea'' (parasitic on grasses and cereals), ''C. fusiformis'' (on pearl millet, buffel grass), ''C. paspali'' (on dallis grass), ''C. africana'' (on sorghum), and ''C. lutea'' (on paspalum). ''C. purpurea'' most commonly affects outcrossing species such as rye (its most common host), as well as triticale, wheat, and barley. It affects oats only rarely. ''C. purpurea'' has at least three races or varieties, which differ in their host specificity: *G1 — land grasses of open ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Claviceps Purpurea - Köhler–s Medizinal-Pflanzen-185-en
Ergot ( ) or ergot fungi refers to a group of fungi of the genus ''Claviceps''. The most prominent member of this group is ''Claviceps purpurea'' ("rye ergot fungus"). This fungus grows on rye and related plants, and produces alkaloids that can cause ergotism in humans and other mammals who consume grains contaminated with its fruiting structure (called ''ergot sclerotium''). ''Claviceps'' includes about 50 known species, mostly in the tropical regions. Economically significant species include ''C. purpurea'' (parasitic on grasses and cereals), ''C. fusiformis'' (on pearl millet, buffel grass), ''C. paspali'' (on dallis grass), ''C. africana'' (on sorghum), and ''C. lutea'' (on paspalum). ''C. purpurea'' most commonly affects outcrossing species such as rye (its most common host), as well as triticale, wheat, and barley. It affects oats only rarely. ''C. purpurea'' has at least three races or varieties, which differ in their host specificity: *G1 — land grasses of open m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Claviceps Purpurea
''Claviceps purpurea'' is an ergot fungus that grows on the ears of rye and related cereal and forage plants. Consumption of grains or seeds contaminated with the survival structure of this fungus, the ergot sclerotium, can cause ergotism in humans and other mammals. ''C. purpurea'' most commonly affects outcrossing species such as rye (its most common host), as well as triticale, wheat and barley. It affects oats only rarely. Life cycle An ''ergot kernel'' called ''Sclerotium clavus'' develops when a floret of flowering grass or cereal is infected by an ascospore of ''C. purpurea''. The infection process mimics a pollen grain growing into an ovary during fertilization. Because infection requires access of the fungal spore to the stigma, plants infected by ''C. purpurea'' are mainly outcrossing species with open flowers, such as rye (''Secale cereale'') and Alopecurus. The proliferating fungal mycelium then destroys the plant ovary and connects with the vascular bundle o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Psilocybe Mexicana
''Psilocybe mexicana'' is a psychedelic mushroom. Its first known usage was by the natives of North and Central America over 2,000 years ago. Known to the Aztecs as teotlnanácatl, from the Nahuatl ''teotl'' ("god") + ''nanácatl'' ("fungus"). This species was categorized by French botanist Roger Heim. It was from this species that Dr. Albert Hofmann, working with specimens grown in his Sandoz laboratory, first isolated and named the active entheogenic compounds psilocybin and psilocin. Uncertain of whether or not the artificially cultivated mushrooms would retain their natural psychoactive properties, Dr. Hofmann consumed 32 specimens. The following is his account of the experience, published in his classic text, ''The Botany and Chemistry of Hallucinogens'': As I was perfectly aware that my knowledge of the Mexican origin of the mushrooms would lead me to imagine only Mexican scenery, I tried deliberately to look on my environment as I knew it normally. But all voluntary effor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pleurotus Tuber-regium
''Pleurotus tuber-regium'', the king tuber mushroom, is an edible gilled fungus native to the tropics, including Africa, Asia, and Australasia. It has been shown to be a distinct species incapable of cross-breeding and phylogenetically removed from other species of ''Pleurotus''. ''Pleurotustuber-regium'' is a saprotroph found on dead wood, including '' Daniellia'' trees in Africa. As the fungus consumes the wood, it produces a sclerotium, or storage tuber, either within the decaying wood or in the underlying soil. These sclerotia are round, dark brown with white interiors, and up to 30 cm wide. The fruiting bodies then emerge from the sclerotium. Both the sclerotium and the fruiting bodies are edible. In addition to being saprotrophic, ''P. tuber-regium'' is also nematophagous, catching nematodes by paralyzing them with a toxin. ''Pleurotus tuber-regium'' has a history of economic importance in Africa as food and as a medicinal mushroom. Industrial cultivation is not yet ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fungi
A fungus ( : fungi or funguses) is any member of the group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds, as well as the more familiar mushrooms. These organisms are classified as a kingdom, separately from the other eukaryotic kingdoms, which by one traditional classification include Plantae, Animalia, Protozoa, and Chromista. A characteristic that places fungi in a different kingdom from plants, bacteria, and some protists is chitin in their cell walls. Fungi, like animals, are heterotrophs; they acquire their food by absorbing dissolved molecules, typically by secreting digestive enzymes into their environment. Fungi do not photosynthesize. Growth is their means of mobility, except for spores (a few of which are flagellated), which may travel through the air or water. Fungi are the principal decomposers in ecological systems. These and other differences place fungi in a single group of related organisms, named the ''Eumycota'' (''t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Medicinal Mushrooms
Medicinal fungi are fungi that contain metabolites or can be induced to produce metabolites through biotechnology to develop prescription drugs. Compounds successfully developed into drugs or under research include antibiotics, anti-cancer drugs, cholesterol and ergosterol synthesis inhibitors, psychotropic drugs, immunosuppressants and fungicides. History Although fungi products have long been used in traditional medicine, the ability to identify beneficial properties and then extract the active ingredient started with the discovery of penicillin by Alexander Fleming in 1928. Since that time, many potential antibiotics were discovered and the potential for various fungi to synthesize biologically active molecules useful in various clinical therapies has been under research. Pharmacological research identified antifungal, antiviral, and antiprotozoan compounds from fungi. '' Ganoderma lucidum'', known in Chinese as líng zhī ("spirit plant"), and in Japanese as mannentake ("10 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ergotism
Ergotism (pron. ) is the effect of long-term ergot poisoning, traditionally due to the ingestion of the alkaloids produced by the ''Claviceps purpurea'' fungus—from the Latin "club" or clavus "nail" and for "head", i.e. the purple club-headed fungus—that infects rye and other cereals, and more recently by the action of a number of ergoline-based drugs. It is also known as ergotoxicosis, ergot poisoning, and Saint Anthony's fire. Signs and symptoms The symptoms can be roughly divided into convulsive symptoms and gangrenous symptoms. Convulsive Convulsive symptoms include painful seizures and spasms, diarrhea, paresthesias, itching, mental effects including mania or psychosis, headaches, nausea and vomiting. Usually the gastrointestinal effects precede central nervous system effects. Gangrenous The dry gangrene is a result of vasoconstriction induced by the ergotamine-ergocristine alkaloids of the fungus. It affects the more poorly vascularized distal structures, such as ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ethnomycology
Ethnomycology is the study of the historical uses and sociological impact of fungi and can be considered a subfield of ethnobotany or ethnobiology. Although in theory the term includes fungi used for such purposes as tinder, medicine (medicinal mushrooms) and food (including yeast), it is often used in the context of the study of psychoactive mushrooms such as psilocybin mushrooms, the ''Amanita muscaria'' mushroom, and the ergot fungus. American banker Robert Gordon Wasson pioneered interest in this field of study in the late 1950s, when he and his wife became the first Westerners on record allowed to participate in a mushroom ''velada'', held by the Mazatec '' curandera'' María Sabina. The biologist Richard Evans Schultes is also considered an ethnomycological pioneer. Later researchers in the field include Terence McKenna, Albert Hofmann, Ralph Metzner, Carl Ruck, Blaise Daniel Staples, Giorgio Samorini, Keewaydinoquay Peschel, John Marco Allegro, Clark Heinrich, John W. Allen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Homology (biology)
In biology, homology is similarity due to shared ancestry between a pair of structures or genes in different taxa. A common example of homologous structures is the forelimbs of vertebrates, where the wings of bats and birds, the arms of primates, the front flippers of whales and the forelegs of four-legged vertebrates like dogs and crocodiles are all derived from the same ancestral tetrapod structure. Evolutionary biology explains homologous structures adapted to different purposes as the result of descent with modification from a common ancestor. The term was first applied to biology in a non-evolutionary context by the anatomist Richard Owen in 1843. Homology was later explained by Charles Darwin's theory of evolution in 1859, but had been observed before this, from Aristotle onwards, and it was explicitly analysed by Pierre Belon in 1555. In developmental biology, organs that developed in the embryo in the same manner and from similar origins, such as from matching p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edema
Edema, also spelled oedema, and also known as fluid retention, dropsy, hydropsy and swelling, is the build-up of fluid in the body's Tissue (biology), tissue. Most commonly, the legs or arms are affected. Symptoms may include skin which feels tight, the area may feel heavy, and joint stiffness. Other symptoms depend on the underlying cause. Causes may include Chronic venous insufficiency, venous insufficiency, heart failure, kidney problems, hypoalbuminemia, low protein levels, liver problems, deep vein thrombosis, infections, angioedema, certain medications, and lymphedema. It may also occur after prolonged sitting or standing and during menstruation or pregnancy. The condition is more concerning if it starts suddenly, or pain or shortness of breath is present. Treatment depends on the underlying cause. If the underlying mechanism involves Hypernatremia, sodium retention, decreased salt intake and a diuretic may be used. Elevating the legs and support stockings may be useful ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ascospores
An ascus (; ) is the sexual spore-bearing cell produced in ascomycete fungi. Each ascus usually contains eight ascospores (or octad), produced by meiosis followed, in most species, by a mitotic cell division. However, asci in some genera or species can occur in numbers of one (e.g. ''Monosporascus cannonballus''), two, four, or multiples of four. In a few cases, the ascospores can bud off conidia that may fill the asci (e.g. ''Tympanis'') with hundreds of conidia, or the ascospores may fragment, e.g. some '' Cordyceps'', also filling the asci with smaller cells. Ascospores are nonmotile, usually single celled, but not infrequently may be coenocytic (lacking a septum), and in some cases coenocytic in multiple planes. Mitotic divisions within the developing spores populate each resulting cell in septate ascospores with nuclei. The term ocular chamber, or oculus, refers to the epiplasm (the portion of cytoplasm not used in ascospore formation) that is surrounded by the "bourr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
