Brief video from Kew Gardens mycologists on what fungi are, and their ecological importance.
http://www.kew.org/discover/videos/beyond-gardens-fungarium-kew
This site is the first step towards digitization and dissemination of fungal biodiversity in the country. It arises from the work of several years of people working daily with specimens of different species and orders of the great Kingdom Fungi.
This site, through the navigation bar on the right, will give an overview about the major taxa and those characteristics that distinguish empirically. In addition you can access the most frequently used to search for bibliographic and photographic material on the species of interest by accessing “Useful Sites” in the top menu.
For those interested in actively participating, can register as a user to upload their photographs.
Kingdom Fungi is one of the most diverse groups of eukaryotes with estimates ranging from 500,000 to nearly 10 million species, yet they remain vastly underdocumented (Bass & Richards, 2011). Present rates of description, which add on average about 1,200 new species annually (Hibbett et al., 2011), are grossly inadequate for the task. Given that human society has derived tremendous benefit from the foods, medicines, and ecological services provided by as little as 1% of the fungi we know of, the impact of this missing diversity on human livelihoods is potentially profound. Importantly, this missing diversity is not just restricted to remote, underexplored regions of the world, but is a pervasive phenomenon where even our foods can harbor unknown species. Although taxonomists regard new fungal taxa as commonplace, they are often of little apparent consequence to human society and largely go unnoticed by the public. Like all groups of organisms, our knowledge of fungal diversity is biased towards taxa of greatest concern to ourselves, such as edible fungi. For example, wild mushrooms collected and sold as food around the world generally belong to a handful of well-known taxa (e.g., truffles and chanterelles), most of which have long histories of use in European cuisine.
Bass D, Richards TA. 2011. Three reasons to re-evaluate fungal diversity ‘on Earth and in the ocean’. Fungal Biology Reviews 25:159-164
Hibbett DS, Ohman A, Glotzer D, Nuhn M, Kirk PM, Nilsson RH. 2011. Progress in molecular and morphological taxon discovery in Fungi and options for formal classification of environmental sequences. Fungal Biology Reviews 39:147-182
(From Dentinger and Suz 2014)
Abstract
Fungi are the group of eukaryotic organisms such as yeast, mold, and mushrooms. The present work investigated the impact of biofield treatment on different pathogenic species of fungi in relation to antifungal sensitivity pattern. Each fungal sample was divided into three parts: C, control; T1, treatment (revived); T2 treatment (lyophilized). Treatment groups received the biofield treatment, and control group was remained as untreated. Mini-API ID32C strip employed for evaluation of antifungal sensitivity and minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC). The results showed that sensitivity of Candida albicans in T1 cells was changed against itraconazole from intermediate (I) to resistance (R) on day 10. The Candida kefyr exhibited a change in susceptibility against itraconazole in T2 cell from S→I, on day 10. Likewise, Candida krusei showed the alterations in sensitivity against two antifungal drugs: fluconazole from S→I (T1 on day 10) and itraconazole S→I (T1 and T2 on all assessment days). The Cryptococcus neoformans changed from S→I in T1 cell on day 5 and 10, against itraconazole. Sensitivity of Candida tropicalis was also altered from I→R against flucytosine (T1 and T2, on all assessment days). Similarly, Saccharomyces cerevisae altered from S→I (T1) and S→R (T2) on day 10. The MIC values of antifungal drugs were altered in the range of 2-8 folds, as compared to the control. Fungal identification data showed the significant changes in species similarity of few tested fungi as C. albicans changed from 91.9% to 98.5 and 99.9% in T1 and T2 cells, respectively on day 10. C. krusei was changed from 97.9% to 85.9% (T2 day 10), and C. tropicalis was altered from 88.7% to 99.6% (T1 day 5) and 99.0% (T2). These findings suggest that biofield treatment could be applied to alter the susceptibility pattern of antifungal drug therapy in future.
