The "Blob": monocellular species, half fungus, half yeast

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Re: The "Blob": a monocellular species, half fungus, half yeast




by sen-no-sen » 23/06/17, 14:20

Ahmed wrote: assuming a form of consciousness, I wonder what they might think of a fleeting species like ours? : roll:


Little digression: in the series X-files Asked frontiers of reality in the episode "spore", the agents Mulder et Scully are trapped by a fungus giant, the latter being able to parasitize the brains of its hosts and project them into a virtual reality (ancestor of Matrix) this in order to extinguish any form of combativeness in its prey before digesting them ...

Some of its organisms are among the largest living creatures in the world:
When we think of the largest organism in the world, we may imagine that it is the blue whale or a huge, very old tree. However, scientists have discovered a gigantic mushroom that occupies the equivalent of 1665 football fields. DGS tells you everything about the largest living being known on earth.
Scientists discovered the existence of this fungus after researching an Oregon national forest where many trees died without explanation. The “honey-colored mushroom”, that is its name, covers almost 965 hectares of land. It looks about 2400 years old, but scientists believe it could be even older.

http://dailygeekshow.com/organisme-geant-vivant-monde-champignon-decouverte/
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Re: The "Blob": a monocellular species, half fungus, half yeast




by Christophe » 24/06/17, 00:02

The CNRS conference of the day on the "blob":

https://www.facebook.com/cnrs.fr/videos/1589562814400661/
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Re: The "Blob": a monocellular species, half fungus, half yeast




by Janic » 27/06/17, 10:05

question and therefore answer remained pending Exhi ... etc.
In addition, life poses a funny chicken and egg problem for us: knowing that the genetic code makes it possible to synthesize proteins, but that proteins are essential for the replication of the genetic code, which of the two came first?

Inept question, the fact that neither of them arrived as is and at the same time!

Great, finally someone who will tell us how it happened!

So Mr I know everything: the answer which also concerns the mushrooms in question.
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Re: The "Blob": a monocellular species, half fungus, half yeast




by izentrop » 27/06/17, 11:43

Not the June 23 conf video, but it must have looked like this:



The blob is fashionable, but everything being single-celled like the paramecium has the same belly intelligence and survival;)
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Re: The "Blob": a monocellular species, half fungus, half yeast




by sen-no-sen » 12/11/17, 22:08

A fungus that takes control of its ants victims to spread *:

It exists in nature, and your Guru tells you time and time again, a fungus which takes control of a living ant and uses it to spread its spores in / on the anthill. It was previously thought that the fungus had a (chemical) influence on the victim's brain, but now a new study by the State University of Pennsylvania (Pen State) has found that the fungus zombifies these ants without directly infecting the brain of its victims ... In fact, it's much more horrible than that.


“Normally in animals, the brain controls behaviors by sending signals to muscles, but our results suggest that the parasite controls the behavior of the host at the periphery. Almost like a puppeteer pulling strings to move a puppet, the fungus. controls the ant's muscles to manipulate the host's legs and mandibles "


http://www.gurumed.org/2017/11/11/le-champignon-zombificateur-de-fourmis-est-plus-diabolique-que-prvu/


* There is another phenomenon that takes control of its hosts to develop, I let you think about it ... 8)
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Re: The "Blob": a monocellular species, half fungus, half yeast




by sen-no-sen » 17/10/19, 21:30

The parasite that turns ants into zombies is not hidden ... in the brain

Once parasitized by a fungus Ophiocordyceps unilateralis, carpenter ants of the species Camponotus leonardi become real puppets. Indeed, according to a new study published in October 2017 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA, the brains of these animals remain intact while the fungus develops in the head, thorax, abdomen and even the legs. of the ant to control its movements by directly manipulating the muscles.

Cell-scale interactions discovered through cutting-edge technologies

At the end of the parasitism, Ophiocordyceps unilateralis takes advantage of the last strengths of its host to make it close its mandibles on a leaf and thus fix the insect in a suitable place until its death. This moment is a key stage in the life cycle of the fungus because it will lead to the formation of a peduncle, at the back of the ant's head, which will disseminate spores. The researchers, from American universities, wanted to understand the interactions between the host and the fungus which occur just before this time but at the cellular level.

For this, they used a machine capable of cutting the tissues of an infected ant into slices of 50 nanometers, and taking a photograph of them each time. This technology makes it possible to produce 2000 cuts in 24 hours. The amount of data collected being phenomenal, the scientists then used a machine-learning algorithm capable of analyzing the images in order to differentiate the cells of the host from those of the parasite. The coupling of these technologies finally made it possible to obtain a particularly precise 3D model making it possible to visualize, on a cellular scale, the distribution of the fungus in the body of the insect.
Mushrooms in ant costume

According to the results obtained, the parasite grows throughout the body except in the brain. "This implies that the control of the ant body by the fungus occurs at the periphery" without the brain needing to transmit messages to the muscles, the researchers noted in the study. Ophiocordyceps unilateralis cells enter the insect's muscle fibers, bonding to each other, forming a network that traps the muscles. "In essence, the insects being manipulated are fungi in ant costume," said David Hughes, lead author of the study, in a statement. "It's a bit like when a puppeteer pulls the strings to move his puppet. The fungus controls the muscles of the ant to manipulate its legs and mandibles," he continues.


https://www.sciencesetavenir.fr/animaux/insectes/une-fois-parasitee-les-fourmis-charpentieres-sont-plus-marionnettes-que-zombies_118139
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Re: The "Blob": a monocellular species, half fungus, half yeast




by izentrop » 17/10/19, 22:03

sen-no-sen wrote: a fungus Ophiocordyceps unilateralis
is not a slime mold
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Re: The "Blob": a monocellular species, half fungus, half yeast




by sen-no-sen » 17/10/19, 22:15

Logical since it is a mushroom.
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Re: The "Blob": a monocellular species, half fungus, half yeast




by izentrop » 17/10/19, 22:33

It is not the same subject of the blows : Wink:
That said, this story of fungus taking control of an ant is interesting. There are other takeovers in nature and you could open a topic on it. : Wink:
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Re: The "Blob": a monocellular species, half fungus, half yeast




by Christophe » 18/10/19, 03:46

Brainless Intelligence?

Well, I already knew the opposite! : Cheesy:
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