Fungi–which include molds and mushrooms, amongst others–play important roles in every ecosystem, but can also create diseases in plants and animals. Fungi can rapidly reproduce, so living systems must fend them off early to avoid their spread and potential, physical harm. Living systems use both physical and chemical strategies to protect from fungi, and must ensure that these strategies don’t harm the threatened living system itself. For example, a pumpkin’s skin has antifungal proteins to prevent fungal growth without harming the pumpkin itself.
In living systems, microbes play important roles, such as breaking down organic matter and maintaining personal and system health. But they also pose threats. Bacteria can be pathogens that cause diseases. Some bacteria create colonies called biofilms that can coat surfaces, reducing their effectiveness–for example, inhibiting a leaf’s ability to photosynthesize. Living systems must have strategies for protecting from microbes that cause disease or become so numerous that they create an imbalance in the system. At the same time, living systems must continue living in harmony with other microbes. Some living systems kill microbes. Others repel without killing to reduce the chances that microbes will adapt to the lethal strategy and become resistant to it. For example, some pea seedlings exude a chemical that inhibits biofilm buildup.
Kingdom Fungi: Mildews, molds, mushrooms, rusts, smuts, and yeasts
Once thought to be more closely related to plants, fungi have been found to contain chitin in their cell walls, indicating a closer evolutionary relationship to animals. Fungi are decomposers, using digestive enzymes to break down their surroundings, making them an essential part of ecosystems worldwide, as new soil is formed from rotting matter. Almost all fungi reproduce through spores (mushrooms, molds) or asexual budding (some yeast). There are estimated to be more than 2 million species, but only about 140,000 have been described. Fungi have great importance in culture, food, and medicine (including being the source of penicillin) worldwide.
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