The ability to activate different sets of genes has likely helped the chytrid fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis spread widely in amphibians, resulting in global population declines.
Environmental pressure seems to spawn changes in the intrinsically disordered regions of enzymes in polar yeasts, allowing them to adapt to extreme cold.
Tortoise leaf beetles enjoy the protection the fungus provides from insect predators such as ants, then carry the microbe to a mutual plant host, which their fungal symbiont infects.
Advances in sequencing technologies have finally allowed researchers to zero in on the genetic diversity underlying the incredible mating system of shelf fungi.
Forest floor-dwelling fungi can send one another electrical signals to form word-like clusters, according to a computer scientist, but whether that represents something akin to language isn’t clear.
Comparing the genomes of modern pathogens with those of cryopreserved strains from several decades ago shed light on the evolution of coffee wilt disease outbreaks in Africa.
In a first, patients who hadn’t been treated with antifungals were found to carry Candida auris impervious to all three available classes of the drugs.
The New Mexico State University soil microbiologist uses molecular tools to understand how fungi are adapting to a warming world and what that might mean for global nutrient cycles.
Mechanically sensitive proteins called gellins sense and respond to protoplasm flowing out of severed hyphae, quickly sealing up injuries in these root-like structures of fungi.