SCITECHDAILY - In some of the driest places on Earth, the ground itself can be alive. What looks like a thin, dark crust on desert soil may actually be a miniature ecosystem, packed with mosses, fungi, bacteria, algae, and tiny animals. These biological soil crusts help hold fragile landscapes together, trapping dust, storing nutrients, and...
EARTH.COM - Moss seems to get by on almost nothing. It colonizes bare rock, survives near-total desiccation, and springs back minutes after rain. The vast majority of land plants form underground partnerships with fungi, trading sugars for nutrients they can’t reach alone. Mosses had always been treated as the exception. New research from California’s desert...
KNOWABLE MAGAZINE - ore than three decades ago, amphibian researchers from around the globe converged on Canterbury, England, for the first World Congress of Herpetology — and, over drinks, shared the same frightening tale. Frogs were disappearing in the wild, and no one could explain why. ... Researchers also have discovered a virus of fungi...
FORBES - A deadly fungus that is devastating frogs and toads around the world may in fact be vulnerable to a virus that can infect it. The fungus, Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis also known as Bd or the amphibian chytrid fungus, causes chytridiomycosis in amphibians. This fungus is a pathogen that infects and destroys the skin of...
EARTH.COM - A team of scientists led by the University of California, Riverside (UCR) may have found a potential weak point in the fight against a fungus decimating frog and toad populations across the globe. The study focused on a virus that infects the fungus responsible for the global amphibian pandemic, offering a possible avenue...
COSMOS - There’s new hope today for the future of the globe’s amphibians which are being wiped out by a devastating disease. The fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis, or Bd, causes the amphibian disease chytridiomycosis. Now, the first discovery of a virus that infects Bd has been described in a paper in the journal Current Biology, which...
THE SCIENTIST - Mycelium is the fabric of fungal populations: fungi produce thread-like roots called hyphae, which branch and fuse with one another to form a vast, interconnected network—the mycelium. It allows fungi to grow rapidly, transport nutrients, and even share information about the local environment over long distances. The network is also vulnerable; a...
Washington, DC – In February, the American Academy of Microbiology (Academy) elected 68 new Fellows to the Class of 2020. Fellows of the American Academy of Microbiology, an honorific leadership group within the ASM, are elected annually through a highly selective, peer-review process, based on their records of scientific achievement and original contributions that have...
By Joanna Urban | American Academy of Microbiology |
