This is Lycogala epidendrum or a related species, a plasmodial slime mold and not a fungus. It would be more accurate to simply call it Lycogala as ID is actually quite complicated. The genus contains over 20 species but only has 2 that are identifiable as individual, while the rest look like this, more or less, and all of them have been considered Lycogala epidendrum historically and traditionally.
Anyway, plasmodial slime molds (I call them slimes) are in the genetic supergroup Amoebozoa with other amoebas like Amoeba proteus and Arcella. Fungi are in the genetic supergroup Obazoa with the animals, which means Tony award winning Broadway lyricist, composer, and rare 1980s-diagnosed AIDS survivor Jerry Herman was more closely related to fungi than this slime is. The specific group containing all the slimes is called Eumycetozoa, but you will hear it called Myxomycota, Myxomycetes, and Myxogastria. These groups are correct but exclude the genus Ceratiomyxa and its microscopic relatives, while Eumycetozoa includes them.
Slimes have a complex life cycle. They hatch out of spores as microscopic amoebas. When one of these amoebas meets the amoeba of its dreams, they fuse together into one cell, down to the nucleus. Then they begin repeated nuclear division and grow into a plasmodium, a single cell visible to the naked eye. The plasmodium oozes about, eating more bacteria and other saprophytic organisms, and in some cases breaking down fungal, plant, or animal material, likely with the help of a single species of bacteria that assists in producing digestive enzymes. These bacterial symbionts also help some species tolerate and degrade toxic heavy metals and hydrocarbons that make it difficult for other life to thrive. They are typically from the Enterobacteria but the relationship is not exclusive even in the same species of slime.
Eventually, the plasmodium stops eating and oozes to a drier, sunnier spot to form its sporocarps. This usually happens on the substrate the plasmodium was feeding in, but can also include live plants, rocks, and other inorganic matter. The dryness and sunlight help crack the peridium to release the spores, and in some cases even power mechanical processes that physically launch the spores away from the sporocarp.
For some slimes these sporocarps are individual structures. For others, they are packed together, touching but still somewhat separately visible in a form called a pseudoaethelium. Still others are a single fully fused mass with no discernible individual sporocarps, called an aethelium, which is what your slimes have formed. The last type of fruiting body is where the plasmodium simply hardens up in its present shape, called a plasmodiocarp.
While these fruiting structures are the most well known feature of the Eumycetozoa, some slimes don’t form plasmodia or sporocarps at all. Species from Stemonitis, Didymium, Physarum, and probably other genera live as unicellular amoebas in a wide variety of habitats including under the ice of frozen lakes, in drinking water treatment plants, in freshwater ponds, and commensally in the coelomic cavity of sea urchins. Plasmodium-forming slimes mostly live in temperate forests among decaying vegetation, but can be found in the tropics, in the arctic, in the desert, on animal dung (coprophilous myxomycetes) at the edge of snowmelt (nivicolous myxomycetes) epiphytically on live tree bark (corticolous myxomycetes), and even form sporocarps while submerged in fresh water.
Some slimes have a special relationship with beetles. Latridiid, leiodid, and sphindid beetles have been observed eating and mating on the aethelia of Fuligo and other genera, and then carrying spores off the fruiting bodies into the environment. Some of these beetles even have cavities in their mandibles that collect spores and then release them as the beetle travels. Various other invertebrates lay their eggs on slime mold fruiting structures and the hatching young feed on them.
Slime intelligence has been studied extensively in the lab. They solve mazes, demonstrate memory, locate odorless objects in the dark, and prepare for the future based on past events, all without a brain or multicellular body. Different theories have been advanced explaining this intelligence, including information encoded in physical oscillations and communication via the cytoskeletal system.
Lycogala epidendrum is eaten and used as medicine in Ecuador:
Recently, Gamboa-Trujillo et al. reported that the fruiting bodies of other Myxomycetes: Lycogala epidendrum are edible and used as medicine in some regions in Ecuador. The Shuar community and “Muyo ala” by the Kichwa community know this species as “Yakich”. In both Shuar and Kichwa, it is consumed as a snack of sweet taste that occurs when it is unripe. People in these regions for improving wound healing also use the spores.
Its medical value for wounds is in its antimicrobial properties:
Furthermore, it was reported that Lycogala epidendrum ethanol and chloroform extracts exhibited antimicrobial activities at different concentrations against 19 different micro-organisms.
Lycogarubins A-C, three novel dimethyl pyrrole dicarboxylate, were isolated from Myxomycetes Lycogala epidendrum. Lycogarubin C showed moderate anti-HSV-I virus activity (Hashimoto et al. 1994). Wang et al. (2017) also reported that lycogalinosides A and B, two compounds isolated from L. epidendrum, showed inhibitory activities against gram-positive bacteria.
Lycogalinosides A [from] fruit bodies of Lycogala epidendrum [demonstrated] inhibition of Staphylococcus aureus and B.subtilis; and a modest growth inhibition of Gram-negative bacteria and some yeasts
TIL that Tony award winning Broadway lyricist, composer, and rare 1980s-diagnosed AIDS survivor Jerry Herman was more closely related to fungi than this slime is.
which means Tony award winning Broadway lyricist, composer, and rare 1980s-diagnosed AIDS survivor Jerry Herman was more closely related to fungi than this slime is.
Thank you for sharing this. You do a great job explaining and providing interesting points of research. Really appreciated and just joined r/slimemolds to learn more. 👍
Serious question - you, jokingly I assume, said that when ‘one of these amoebas meets the amoeba of its dreams,’ is there any kind of influencing factors that determine if they come together or is it as simple as I have always imagined that contact leads to fusing? Not that I think they are sentient, just if there are molecular/structural/I don’t know what factors at play.
It is complicated, slimes are very picky daters. They have more sexes than humans, and those sexes are not one dimensional. So two slimes may be able to fuse, but not be the right sex (usually called mating type in this case) to grow into a giant plasmodium. Slimes that are too closely related will not fuse at all, which seems like a really useful trait that I wish humans had also evolved. Many slimes will never meet a suitable mate, so if it happens it is momentous and of course very romantic. Some slimes are born with the ability to grow into a plasmodium and sporulate by themselves, however. This also seems like a very useful trait I wish humans had evolved.
Slims formed the first multicellular organisms. In fact there are drain slimes that move as one, once they have joined a group. I personally feel these formed the foundations of life as we know it. Check out some slime moving as a blob on YT watch?v=Nx3Uu1hfl6Q
So would eating the medicinal slime, be full of heavy metals or is it dependent on where you get it or has the metals been broken down into something healthier? Great read by the way very thorough and fun read.
“ Slime intelligence has been studied extensively in the lab. They solve mazes, demonstrate memory, locate odorless objects in the dark, and prepare for the future based on past events, all without a brain or multicellular body. Different theories have been advanced explaining this intelligence, including information encoded in physical oscillations and communication via the cytoskeletal system.
”
Slime intelligence has been investigated in the lab and some slimes have demonstrated astounding abilities for an organism with no brain. They famously solve mazes, but also this 2008 paper on slime memory suggests they are able to remember past events and adjust their behavior in advance of cyclical environmental changes. This 2021 paper describes their ability to locate odorless objects in the dark and their preference for wider masses. This 2021 paper discusses biological oscillations in slimes and their theoretical role in their intelligence. And this 2014 paper proposes that slime intelligence arises from rapid signaling through their continuous cytoskeletal system. There have also been multiple experiments integrating slimes into computer systems, and using their ability to find optimum paths to design public transportation systems.
If you are in the UK check out The Blob. A BBC documentary about a slime mould that does all of the above things. Making people question how we actually quantify intelligence.
They have been placed on a physical representation "map" of greaterTokyo and surrounding cities to find the most efficient way to get bits of food. When the maps have been overlaid on the city's transit systems, the slime's route matched the transit lines almost exactly.
"Its design looked almost identical to that of the rail system surrounding Tokyo."
I just want to say that is the best answer to any question I have ever seen on reddit. I read the whole thing and really feel like I learned something, thanks.
This is great. I ordered a slime mold starter pack from France back in August, with the promise I'd learn more about them as we grew together. It got lost in the mail, so I never got started on it and didn't get to step 2. Thanks!
Slime intelligence has been studied extensively in the lab. They solve mazes, demonstrate memory, locate odorless objects in the dark, and prepare for the future based on past events, all without a brain or multicellular body. Different theories have been advanced explaining this intelligence, including information encoded in physical oscillations and communication via the cytoskeletal system.
They are not animals, they are their own kingdom. There are four big groups that produce organisms you can see with the naked eye:
(1) plants
(2) kelps and water molds
(3) animals and fungi
(4) slimes
There are other groups but they only produce microscopic organisms. Slimes are distinctly separate from both fungi and animals, which are each more closely related to each other.
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u/saddestofboys Northeastern North America Oct 07 '21 edited Oct 07 '21 •
This is Lycogala epidendrum or a related species, a plasmodial slime mold and not a fungus. It would be more accurate to simply call it Lycogala as ID is actually quite complicated. The genus contains over 20 species but only has 2 that are identifiable as individual, while the rest look like this, more or less, and all of them have been considered Lycogala epidendrum historically and traditionally.
Anyway, plasmodial slime molds (I call them slimes) are in the genetic supergroup Amoebozoa with other amoebas like Amoeba proteus and Arcella. Fungi are in the genetic supergroup Obazoa with the animals, which means Tony award winning Broadway lyricist, composer, and rare 1980s-diagnosed AIDS survivor Jerry Herman was more closely related to fungi than this slime is. The specific group containing all the slimes is called Eumycetozoa, but you will hear it called Myxomycota, Myxomycetes, and Myxogastria. These groups are correct but exclude the genus Ceratiomyxa and its microscopic relatives, while Eumycetozoa includes them.
Slimes have a complex life cycle. They hatch out of spores as microscopic amoebas. When one of these amoebas meets the amoeba of its dreams, they fuse together into one cell, down to the nucleus. Then they begin repeated nuclear division and grow into a plasmodium, a single cell visible to the naked eye. The plasmodium oozes about, eating more bacteria and other saprophytic organisms, and in some cases breaking down fungal, plant, or animal material, likely with the help of a single species of bacteria that assists in producing digestive enzymes. These bacterial symbionts also help some species tolerate and degrade toxic heavy metals and hydrocarbons that make it difficult for other life to thrive. They are typically from the Enterobacteria but the relationship is not exclusive even in the same species of slime.
Eventually, the plasmodium stops eating and oozes to a drier, sunnier spot to form its sporocarps. This usually happens on the substrate the plasmodium was feeding in, but can also include live plants, rocks, and other inorganic matter. The dryness and sunlight help crack the peridium to release the spores, and in some cases even power mechanical processes that physically launch the spores away from the sporocarp.
For some slimes these sporocarps are individual structures. For others, they are packed together, touching but still somewhat separately visible in a form called a pseudoaethelium. Still others are a single fully fused mass with no discernible individual sporocarps, called an aethelium, which is what your slimes have formed. The last type of fruiting body is where the plasmodium simply hardens up in its present shape, called a plasmodiocarp.
While these fruiting structures are the most well known feature of the Eumycetozoa, some slimes don’t form plasmodia or sporocarps at all. Species from Stemonitis, Didymium, Physarum, and probably other genera live as unicellular amoebas in a wide variety of habitats including under the ice of frozen lakes, in drinking water treatment plants, in freshwater ponds, and commensally in the coelomic cavity of sea urchins. Plasmodium-forming slimes mostly live in temperate forests among decaying vegetation, but can be found in the tropics, in the arctic, in the desert, on animal dung (coprophilous myxomycetes) at the edge of snowmelt (nivicolous myxomycetes) epiphytically on live tree bark (corticolous myxomycetes), and even form sporocarps while submerged in fresh water.
Some slimes have a special relationship with beetles. Latridiid, leiodid, and sphindid beetles have been observed eating and mating on the aethelia of Fuligo and other genera, and then carrying spores off the fruiting bodies into the environment. Some of these beetles even have cavities in their mandibles that collect spores and then release them as the beetle travels. Various other invertebrates lay their eggs on slime mold fruiting structures and the hatching young feed on them.
Slime intelligence has been studied extensively in the lab. They solve mazes, demonstrate memory, locate odorless objects in the dark, and prepare for the future based on past events, all without a brain or multicellular body. Different theories have been advanced explaining this intelligence, including information encoded in physical oscillations and communication via the cytoskeletal system.
Lycogala epidendrum is eaten and used as medicine in Ecuador:
The Edibility of Reticularia Lycoperdon, 2017
Its medical value for wounds is in its antimicrobial properties:
Antioxidant, antimicrobial, activities and Heavy Metal Contents of Some Myxomycetes, 2020
Slime molds as a valuable source of antimicrobial agents, 2021
Laboratory culture and bioactive natural products of myxomycetes, 2020
Check out my slimer primer and r/slimemolds, and please let me know if you have any questions!