BIOL 1011 Lecture Notes - Lecture 5: Hypha, Mycelium, Chitin
Introduction to Fungi
January 29, 2015
Examples of Fungi:
• Bread (rising of crust)
• Mold on bread
• Ringworm, athletes foot
• Mushrooms
• Beer, wine, spirits (yeast)
Characteristic of all Fungi:
• Heterotrophs (eat other things)
• Eukaryotic
• Main body is haploid
• Multicellular (except yeast)
• Cell wall made of chitin (not cellulose!)
o Polysaccharide
o Used for shell of arthropods like lobsters or spiders
• External digestion of food
o Absorb what they have already digested
The basic unit is a hypha (plural is hyphae).
A mycelium is a mass of hyphae.
There are two kinds of hyphae:
1. Septate hypha (contains cross walls dividing nuclei)
2. Ceonocytic Hypha (nuclei are not separated)
Hyphae can be specialized for other functions including trapping and killing prey.
Generalized Life Cycle:
*Usually Asexual but Sexual Reproduction consists of 2 separate steps including
zygotic meiosis.
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