A group of basic organic compounds, containing nitrogen and often oxygen, occurring in fungi. Many are poisons and others provide sources for beneficial drugs.

Like an amoeba with the ability to move or change shape by protoplasmic flow using pseudopodia, engulfing food by ingestion (phagocytosis), and possessing a contractile vacuole.

Hyphal bridge that forms between two hyphal elements to maintain protoplasmic continuity within the mycelial system . It also provides the avenue for nuclear exchange and genetic variation.

The inner veil separates from the cap as it expands and remains attached to the stalk. It may appear as a skirt, fringe or web, either intact or in fragments.

A fruitbody type in the Ascomycota (Sac Fungi) in which the spore-bearing surface (hymenium) is exposed at maturity. Apothecia can be saucer-shaped, cup-shaped, saddle-shaped or pitted, as in the morels.

View an illustration of the apothecium.

The name given to any type of fruitbody (cleistothecium, perithecium or apothecium) produced in the Ascomycota (Sac Fungi).

The division or phylum of fungi with septate hyphae in which the spores are formed within a sac-like cell called in ascus. Ascomycetes is the vestigial name of a class of sac fungi.

The network of sterile vegetative hyphae usually buried within the substrate that forms the thallus of a fungus.

A mutually beneficial symbiotic association between the roots of plants, especially trees, and a fungus.

Infection of a human or animal caused by a fungus.

The term used when ingested material is food or feedstuff on which fungus has been growing and producing small amounts of secondary byproducts that have deleterious effects on humans or animals. For example aflatoxin is a mycotoxin produced by Aspergillus flavus when growing on improperly stored foods such as peanuts.

The phylum name of the slime moulds.

(As applied to plants and animals.) Originating in a geographic area and not relocated there by humans.

Fungal tissue that encloses the developing gills or pores of some mushroom species and often remains, after the cap expands, as a ring on the stalk or as a fringe around the edge of the cap.

capable of causing disease

The small (1-3 mm d) spore packet or capsule in the Bird’s Nest Fungi commonly referred to as the ‘egg’.

Tiny, flask-shaped fruitbody (ascoma) produced by some sac fungi, usually less than 1 mm in size.

View an illustration of the perithecium.

The portion of a fruitbody composed of both vegetative and reproductive hyphae.

Alternative name for the bracket fungi whose spores are produced inside of tubes, rather than on gills. Usually they have a corky or woody texture and are often attached laterally to wood.

Name given in the boletes or polypores to the opening end of the spore-bearing tubes.

In the bacteria and blue-green algae (cyanobacteria), the chromosomal material is not bound by a membrane and no nucleus is present. Organelles are also absent from the cytoplasm.

The living content of cells that include the cytoplasm, nuclei, organelles, etc.

thin-walled, usually angular, randomly-arranged cells in fungi, that are tightly packed together. Often used to form walls in specialized structures such as fruitbodies. They are similar in appearance to the parenchyma cells found in plants but different in origin, hence the prefix, pseudo- =false.

The physical and chemical process (oxidative reaction) where oxygen is used by cells and tissues to produce the energy required for metabolic processes, with CO2 and water produced as by-products.

Organisms that feed on dead or dying organic matter, plant or animal; saprobic is the lifestyle of feeding in such a manner.

A nonmotile cell forming by abstriction and functioning as a male gamete, sometimes erroneously called a conidium.

Specialized reproductive cells inside which the spores are produced.

Spores (reproductive units) produced inside a sporangium of slime moulds or other fungi.

A general term used in fungi to describe a structure containing spores. It is used for the small fruitbodies (uniform in size) produced by slime moulds. It is also applied to the tiny fruitbodies of fungi such as the bread mould (Rhizopus) in the division Zygomycota.

General term for the microscopic reproductive unit of a fungus of which there are many types: ascospore, basidiospore, zoospore, etc.

see stipe

A narrow, peglike protuberance from the basidium with a tiny point on which a basidiospore is formed and from which it is forcibly discharged.

The structure of a fungus that anchors the fruitbody to the substrate and supports the cap.

Fungal tissue mass of pseudoparenchyma in or on which the reproductive structures (perithecia) are formed in some sac fungi, e. g. Dead Man's Fingers.

Name given to the vegetative body in fungi and some lower plants where there is no specialized tissue development.

Narrow parallel-sided passages beneath the caps of polypores and boletes, where spores are produced.

Fungal tissue completely enclosing the developing mushroom of some species. It may remain as a cup around the base of the stalk but is often carried up and remnants form as patches scattered over the surface of the cap.

Sticky or slimy.

The technical name given to the cuplike remnants of the universal veil remaining around the base of the stalk.