#ecosystems be so cool

[darkwood-sleddog]

look i love animal/plant/insect id forums, subreddits etc. but it is utterly saddening how many people are clueless about common natural things around them.

[headspace-hotel]

im reading a lot of research about the mycorrhizal network because this is a HUGE emerging area of research and there is so much new stuff coming out its sooooo neat

So basically "the mycorrhizal network is how trees send each other nutrients and help each other" is wrong,

but the main reason people were mad at it—because they thought everything in the ecosystem is selfish and competitive acting for its own interests—is much wronger.

How come?

Well...fungi aren't just a postal service for trees. They have lives of their own! Plants aren't just controlling the mycorrhizal network to send nutrients where they want, they are communicating with the fungus and negotiating the terms of that relationship.

The genetic basis in plants for forming the mycorrhizal symbiosis is old. REALLY old. Like, "before plants even came onto land" OLD. Other forms of symbiosis, like what legumes have going on with the Rhizobia, are using the same genes to do their thing. There's a LOT of genes involved with creating the symbiosis, including some redundancies just to be safe, and we're only just now starting to understand them.

Why so many genes? What are all these genes for? Everything! Communication chemicals, hormones the other partner will respond to, flipping switches in the other partner's genes. There was a lot of arguing over which partner, the plant or the fungus, was "controlling" the partnership, but this question turned out to be total nonsense. Both symbionts have to recognize each other, respond to each other, prepare for symbiosis by adjusting how their genes are expressed, form the symbiosis, and continuously negotiate the relationship by exchanging chemical signals. Both can actively select the partner that offers the best benefits. There's even experiments where it's been shown that if the fungus turns parasitic, the plant will start secreting fungicidal chemicals. (But also the mutualist fungi in the experiment outcompeted the parasitic one when the pots were seeded with both.)

Mycorrhizal symbiosis is an incredibly intimate relationship. Like, the fungus produces special organs that literally grow inside the plant's cells, and the plant is actively participating in allowing this to happen. The plants and fungi have genes for hormones used by the other species, they have soooooo much stuff encoded in their DNA for interacting with their symbionts, it's like, blurring the lines for whether they're even separate organisms. There are SO many chemicals involved in communication between them and we only understand a few of those chemicals.

This is SO MUCH COOLER than if the plants were just using the fungus as a passive conduit to communicate with and support each other. The fungus is actively participating!

We were fools and assumed there had to be one partner that was "in control," but both plant AND fungus have to initiate and to some extent they're each engaging on their own terms! Or maybe it's better to think of them as one and the same organism?

We're also finding out that there's a lot more types of mycorrhizal symbiosis than we thought (at least five) and a lot more variety in how it works.

And that's not even getting into fungal endosymbionts—fungi that live inside plant cells completely instead of having part of them be outside and in the soil. They aren't considered mycorrhizae because they're fully inside the plant cells and not connected with any soil fungi network but they do a lot of complicated things we don't understand and interact with the plant's other symbionts.

Fungal endosymbionts produce a lot of chemicals that are useful to the plants in some way, and it turns out, that a lot of them kill cancer. Seriously, we've gotten a LOT of anti-cancer drugs from these guys. I think it's because they have to bypass the plant's immune system, but they also fight each other/other little guys that get inside plant cells, so they kind of...are part of the plant's immune system?

And what's MORE

Is that plants and fungus aren't the only things part of this system! There's also bacteria that are symbiotic with the plants and fungi! Even the endosymbiont fungi have bacteria that are endosymbionts inside THEM. Double endosymbiosis.

I think I read one paper saying the bacteria use the fungi to get around? Like that's how Rhizobia find their way to the legume roots in the first place? Have to double check that one

[fishyfishyfishtimes]

I can't believe people would slander ocean sunfish for having a lot of parasites. Uh, hello?? Every animal in nature has parasites dipshit, it came free with living in an ecosystem

[tubbytarchia]

Hey so, funny thing happened

hey what if I cried

[beanghostprincess]

I may be off, but I would say people who passionately hate Shuggy are either:

a) Buggy haters

b) People who don't want Shanks to have emotional connections other than Luffy

c) Luffy

d) Buggy himself

(Personally, I like it either platonicaly or romantically.)

Luffy is also A and B. Buggy is also A.

[frnrwnd]

Hello tf2 fandom have a cat

[himejoshiangels]

I hope everyone whose ever called we are robin a cult or a gang knows that every time they do that an angel loses its wings. they r literally just bffs..only reason they're ever called a gang is bcs they're inner-city kids but watching them interact GYAH! they're taking the Q train to fight crime and in a big group chat full of kids all over giving tips about they best way to throw a punch without hurting your own hand too bad

[nando161mando]

"i love that instead of just not thinking climate change is a big deal, conservatives like jordan peterson have just begun denying basic biological truths such as “environmental factors affects species in different ways”

https://bird.makeup/users/junlper/statuses/1688369187226288128

[reksink]

A Bloody Conflict, is it Not? At Least Less Will Die From This Cursed Blade

Art Trade with the delightful @flame-shadow 💚

[bewaretheidesofmarchyall]

Bolas vs. Soulfire = band kids vs. choir kids

[katsuo-asanuma-official]

I need to collect moss

moss is so amazing genuinely

just about a 6x6ft square (I think..) of moss reduces pollution by about the same amount as 175 trees!

and it's also home to so many amazing creatures like tardigrades :D

[jadedaegis]

people really slept so fucking hard on Star Fox: Adventures and I will die on that hill. The reason Star Fox never has any sequels is because the fans seem to demand that they re-invent the wheel and just release "Star Fox 64 but better" (whatever that means) Like- Seriously. Imagine a re-interpretation where, perhaps, Krystal isn't locked up. Give her the staff to manipulate the Blue Guy Avatar-ass mystic temples. THERE ARE MAMMOTHS AND TRICERATOPS AND STEGOSAURS AND TYRANNOSAURS ALL ON THE SAME ASS PLANET THIS IMPLIES A LOGIC OF "oh, hey, no-one actually gave a shit about when the period was!" WHICH MEANS A RE-IMAGINING COULD INCORPORATE, I DON'T KNOW, MAYBE FUCKING CAMBRIAN AND PERMIAN AND TRIASSIC CRITTERS.

[heliotrope155]

hey you guys it's US AGAIN!

Gets better and better.

[artaintfartwarriors]

[queers4years]

Indigenous Hawaiians really had a good system going: wake up reaaally early and do most of the days work while it's cool and by the time the sun was up and it got hot the work was done and you're free to surf and socialize. I wish the white people realized they themselves could work smarter and not harder and get time to relax. Instead of calling Hawaiians lazy (and being genocidal about it)

[kiqilinn]

i don’t understand why people on here judge and make fun of people so much for consuming “bad art” or anything they find pathetic to watch really…. can we not do that….