{"id":303,"date":"2024-07-29T17:50:32","date_gmt":"2024-07-29T17:50:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/?p=303"},"modified":"2024-07-29T17:50:32","modified_gmt":"2024-07-29T17:50:32","slug":"fungi-are-our-friends","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/2024\/07\/29\/fungi-are-our-friends\/","title":{"rendered":"Fungi Are Our Friends"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>When you hear the word <em>fungi<\/em>, what comes to mind first? Uncomfortable, unpleasant skin or nail infections? A cluster of pale mushrooms in the woods or in the supermarket produce section? If so, you\u2019re not alone\u2014for most people, fungi wouldn\u2019t rank among the top 10 must-have items of this year, or any year.<\/p>\n<p>But just as there are good and bad bacteria, so too are there good and bad fungi. The <em>Penicillium<\/em> fungus, for example, naturally produces the antibiotic penicillin. By growing the fungus in a laboratory, Alexander Fleming and other scientists were able to separate the penicillin from the mold and then purify it, making it suitable for human use and saving countless lives as a result.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s just one example of how the much-maligned fungus has proved itself worthy of appreciation, not something to be avoided. Fungi are stationary plant-like organisms that don\u2019t have chlorophyll. Since they\u2019re unable to produce their own food, fungi are reliant on other sources for food. Some beneficial fungi break down dead matter; some destructive fungi draw sustenance from living organisms, like trees and crops. Brewer\u2019s yeast, yogurt, and blue cheese all contain fungi that are beneficial.<\/p>\n<p>Organisms other than humans also \\benefit from fungi. Lichen, which is formed by symbiosis between a fungus and an alga, often grows on trees. Since the fungus obtains nutrients from the alga it doesn\u2019t take them from its host (i.e., the tree). Rather, lichen is a source of food for some animals, including deer and frogs, and some birds use it to help build or line their nests. Fungi assists trees with communicating with other trees and plants in the area and sharing resources.<\/p>\n<p>When fungi do dine on other organisms, it isn\u2019t necessarily detrimental or harmful. By breaking down and decomposing organic matter, fungi are an essential part in the circle of life. Decomposers\u2014fungi, bacteria, and invertebrates\u2014release nutrients that would otherwise remain in the tissues of dead matter. Those nutrients in turn \u201cfeed\u201d the ecosystem, which we are dependent on for life.<\/p>\n<p>So the next time you hear the word <em>fungi<\/em>, open a container of yogurt, or spot some lichen on trees, take a moment to appreciate an essential, hardworking link in the circle of life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When you hear the word fungi, what comes to mind first? Uncomfortable, unpleasant skin or nail infections? A cluster of pale mushrooms in the woods or in the supermarket produce section? If so, you\u2019re not alone\u2014for most people, fungi wouldn\u2019t rank among the top 10 must-have items of this year, or any year. But just [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-303","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-health-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=303"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":313,"href":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303\/revisions\/313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/clients.computerguru.me\/ps\/wprebuild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}