Biologists have long known mushrooms of the genus Mycena, commonly known as bonnet mushrooms, as fungi that live off of dead trees and plants. New research from the University of Copenhagen demonstrates that bonnets can also find their ways into young, healthy trees and plants, where they try to cooperate. In doing so, they have made an evolutionary leap which challenges our understanding of the ecological roles of fungi.
  • LennethAegis@kbin.social
    45·
    1 year ago

    Article says it only moved to living trees and that its a symbiotic relationship. Which to my understanding of trees, they already do this with other fungi, and this one is just tagging along as well.

    The last of us this is not, not even close.

    • mycatiskai@lemmy.one
      15·
      1 year ago

      Are you sure?

      We are never going to live peacefully with nature in a balance. Maybe nature needs to take us over and balance us out by itself.

        • mycatiskai@lemmy.one
          3·
          1 year ago

          We are nature making non nature things with industry. It took the industrial revolution to push us to where we are with climate change and pollution.

            • mycatiskai@lemmy.one
              2·
              1 year ago

              Well, a beaver dam helps the natural environment by creating water habitats for other creatures. Humans create chemicals that don’t break down forever, plastics that break down over centuries that include microplastics that are now in our bloodstreams and in in whales stomachs. Does any of that human stuff sound like it is natural?

              • Shdwdrgn@beehaw.org
                4·
                1 year ago

                Beaver dams are only helpful because other organisms have learned to make use of that niche. There are already bacteria which have learned how to consume plastics, and others which have been shown to break down oil spills. Nature can fix anything we throw at it, given enough time. Humans may go extinct because we can’t adapt fast enough to the changing conditions, but something else will always come along eventually that can make use of the waste we create.

                • Swedneck@discuss.tchncs.de
                  2·
                  1 year ago

                  rats and many birds are prime examples of species that have already adapted to human cities, and would you look at that they’re EXTREMELY successful and have colonized the entire earth along with us.

  • Tosti@feddit.nl
    12·
    1 year ago

    Darnit! Horror hellscape of fungal infected zombies was not on my 2023 bingo card.

    • jmcs@discuss.tchncs.de
      5·
      1 year ago

      It’s still not on the cards, this is about a mushroom adapting to form a symbiotic relationship with trees. Unless you meant we are at a higher risk of being invaded by zombie ents.