6 ms·

Years ago, in a pool of improperly disposed of motor oil in the corner of my ex-girlfriend's parent's yard, I was amazed to discover mushrooms that started grow

Years ago, in a pool of improperly disposed of motor oil in the corner of my ex-girlfriend's parent's yard, I was amazed to discover mushrooms that started growing in the oil and looked like they were consuming the oil. Each winter, when mushroom conditions were ripest, they returned until the stump the pool of oil gathered around sprouted new branches and started growing again. Turns out there are species of mushrooms that consume oil on the surface of the planet. So this doesn't shock me at all, its an example of how regardless of humanity's arrogance, life on Earth will be around long after our species and its descendants cease to exist, to think otherwise is to prove one's ignorance.

x86x87 3y ago
Yeah. Lookup Mycellium Running by that wacky dude Stamets. There are mushroom species that can be emplotey to cleanup nasty oil spills and stuff. Also, there are mushroom species that can breakdown plastics in effect getting rid of stuff that woulf take hundreds/thousads of years to decompose. Mushrooms are amazing
- x86x87 3y ago
  Here: https://www.ted.com/talks/paul_stamets_6_ways_mushrooms_can_save_the_world https://www.ted.com/talks/paul_stamets_6_ways_mushrooms_can_...
- ProllyInfamous 3y ago
  >Mushrooms are amazing Lichens are incredible. Check out the book Entangled Life, which Paul Stamets proclaims is "a must-read!"
  - x86x87 3y ago
    Lichens are a mix of algae & fungi. :)
    - ProllyInfamous 3y ago
      & bacteria. :)
DANmode 3y ago
Any evidence, here or elsewhere, that it completely consumed the toxic compounds? Neat evidence either way, that they thrive in that condition.
lioeters 3y ago
> Mycoremediation (from ancient Greek μύκης (mukēs), meaning "fungus", and the suffix -remedium, in Latin meaning 'restoring balance') is a form of bioremediation in which fungi-based remediation methods are used to decontaminate the environment. > Fungi have been proven to be a cheap, effective and environmentally sound way for removing a wide array of contaminants from damaged environments or wastewater. These contaminants include heavy metals, organic pollutants, textile dyes, leather tanning chemicals and wastewater, petroleum fuels, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, pharmaceuticals and personal care products, pesticides and herbicides in land, fresh water, and marine environments. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mycoremediation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mycoremediation
wolverine876 3y ago
> life on Earth will be around long after our species and its descendants cease to exist, to think otherwise is to prove one's ignorance. Who says otherwise?
- medoc 3y ago
  It's a common misconception that the reason we should be more frugal is to save the planet, ecosystems, or cute animals.
  - mandmandam 3y ago
    What is the misconception? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction We are killing species at 100-1,000 times the background rate. The damage can never be undone. The Earth may recover, on geological time scales, but 99.9% of those species aren't ever coming back. It's extremely unwise to be committing mass murder on the biosphere like this, and not a matter of "frugality".
  - ceejayoz 3y ago
    “Save the planet” is a short slogan for “not have sentient cockroaches wondering what happened to the folks who dug up all the coal”. No one asserts climate change is gonna crack the planet in half.
  - adammarples 3y ago
    Yeah, ecosystems are fragile, they're equilibria. Of course if you disrupt them you eventually get another one, but I'm quite fond of the ones we have and not looking forward to a cool fungi and jellyfish locust swarm ecosystem or whatever comes next.
  - wolverine876 3y ago
    Personally, I think it's very important, and I think most people would agree, to prevent harm and cost to humans, and to enable them to be free, live long, and prosper. [0] I don't think there's a higher moral or practical imperative - if you don't care about that, what do you care about? The GGP said "life on Earth will be around long after our species and its descendants cease to exist", implying that the extinction of humans was not an issue! Damage to nature, as a general concept, can often shorten lives, cause great harm to the living (warfare, starvation), and cost enormous amounts of money - climate change is very expensive. One reason is that we have enormous amounts of fixed capital - 10,000 years worth, in a way - invested in the ecosystems as they currently are, including all our agriculture, ports, cities, infrastructure, borders, food and water supply, etc. etc. It will be very expensive and pointless to rebuild it all for new ecosystems instead of just retaining what we have. Also, most people agree that harming animals is also wrong, though not nearly on the level of harming humans. If you physically abuse your dog, for example, people will be angry and there are laws against it in most places. And I think most people value what is 'natural' to some degree; it seems like a common value of humanity across time and cultures. They prefer the natural hill to the strip-mined one, the green field to the parking lot. They also like coal and parking their car, so there are competing values too. [0] :)
CSMastermind 3y ago
The biology and evolutionary history of fungi is incredibly fascinating. To my (admittedly layman) understanding, they're sort of life's premiere resource extractors. Their whole thing is breaking down things that other life can't, so it's not surprising at all that some species can consume oil. We know they co-evolved with plants, and one theory suggests that fungi allowed plants to make the jump from water to land by using their hyphae to act as a proto-root system, unlock nutrients like phosphorus from the soil, and transport water, while early land plants provided sugars produced from photosynthesis in return. One of the main differentiations that might have led to the split between proto-fungi and proto-animals is their nutrient acquisition strategy. The organism that would become fungi had extracellular digestion, while the organism that would become animals captured and ingested other organisms. This split led to different approaches to cellular adhesion along with different developmental and signaling pathways (different strategies for achieving homeostasis for instance). --- If you want to read about some really wild stuff, look up the Late Paleozoic era in the Carboniferous period. Basically plants evolved Lignin (wood) but there was nothing in the world that could break it down so it rapidly accumulated along with a hyperoxgenated atmosphere due to the extensive growth. This meant there were 8 foot long millipedes and dragonflies that size of crows flying around. There were also massive forest fires spanning the globe since fire was one of the only ways to get rid of the lignin until, eventually, some fungi evolved to take care of the problem.
- maxmalkav 3y ago
  > Basically plants evolved Lignin (wood) but there was nothing in the world that could break it down so it rapidly accumulated along with a hyperoxgenated atmosphere due to the extensive growth. That was my understanding too until recently, when I have read in a couple of places that things might not have been like that. Checking the Wikipedia article about Carboniferous [1] it seems there is not consensus yet: "There is ongoing debate as to why this peak in the formation of Earth's coal deposits occurred during the Carboniferous. The first theory, known as the delayed fungal evolution hypothesis, is that a delay between the development of trees with the wood fibre lignin and the subsequent evolution of lignin-degrading fungi gave a period of time where vast amounts of lignin-based organic material could accumulate. Genetic analysis of basidiomycete fungi, which have enzymes capable of breaking down lignin, supports this theory by suggesting this fungi evolved in the Permian. However, significant Mesozoic and Cenozoic coal deposits formed after lignin-digesting fungi had become well established, and fungal degradation of lignin may have already evolved by the end of the Devonian, even if the specific enzymes used by basidiomycetes had not. The second theory is that the geographical setting and climate of the Carboniferous were unique in Earth's history: the co-occurrence of the position of the continents across the humid equatorial zone, high biological productivity, and the low-lying, water-logged and slowly subsiding sedimentary basins that allowed the thick accumulation of peat were sufficient to account for the peak in coal formation." One way or another, I find fascinating how different the planet has been along its geologic periods. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carboniferous#Coal_formation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carboniferous#Coal_formation
Shekelphile 3y ago
We are actually in the last 20% of time remaining for life on earth to exist. Multicellular life will likely go extinct within a few hundred million years.
- whutsurnaym 3y ago
  That's not information I'd heard before. Do you have a source?
  - philipkglass 3y ago
    Not a "few" hundred million years, but less than a billion years: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_far_future#Earth,_the_Solar_System,_and_the_Universe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_far_future#Ear... 500-600 million years: The Sun's increasing luminosity begins to disrupt the carbonate–silicate cycle; higher luminosity increases weathering of surface rocks, which traps carbon dioxide in the ground as carbonate. As water evaporates from the Earth's surface, rocks harden, causing plate tectonics to slow and eventually stop once the oceans evaporate completely. With less volcanism to recycle carbon into the Earth's atmosphere, carbon dioxide levels begin to fall. By this time, carbon dioxide levels will fall to the point at which C3 photosynthesis is no longer possible. All plants that use C3 photosynthesis (≈99 percent of present-day species) will die. ... 800-900 million years: Carbon dioxide levels will fall to the point at which C4 photosynthesis is no longer possible. Without plant life to recycle oxygen in the atmosphere, free oxygen and the ozone layer will disappear from the atmosphere allowing for intense levels of deadly UV light to reach the surface. Animals in food chains that were dependent on live plants will disappear shortly afterward. At most, animal life could survive about 3 to 100 million years after plant life dies out. Just like plants, the extinction of animals will likely coincide with the loss of plants. It will start with large animals, then smaller animals and flying creatures, then amphibians, followed by reptiles, and finally, invertebrates. In the book The Life and Death of Planet Earth, authors Peter D. Ward and Donald Brownlee state that some animal life may be able to survive in the oceans. Eventually, however, all multicellular life will die out.
    - 3y ago
Log_out_ 3y ago
So encode human genomes into mushrooms, so we rise again? Great idea
- hypercube33 3y ago
  Wasn't that an episode of SG1 with the mushroom humanoids?

x86x87 3y ago

Yeah. Lookup Mycellium Running by that wacky dude Stamets. There are mushroom species that can be emplotey to cleanup nasty oil spills and stuff. Also, there are mushroom species that can breakdown plastics in effect getting rid of stuff that woulf take hundreds/thousads of years to decompose. Mushrooms are amazing

x86x87 3y ago
Here: https://www.ted.com/talks/paul_stamets_6_ways_mushrooms_can_save_the_world https://www.ted.com/talks/paul_stamets_6_ways_mushrooms_can_...
ProllyInfamous 3y ago
>Mushrooms are amazing Lichens are incredible. Check out the book Entangled Life, which Paul Stamets proclaims is "a must-read!"
- x86x87 3y ago
  Lichens are a mix of algae & fungi. :)
  - ProllyInfamous 3y ago
    & bacteria. :)

DANmode 3y ago

Any evidence, here or elsewhere, that it completely consumed the toxic compounds? Neat evidence either way, that they thrive in that condition.

lioeters 3y ago

> Mycoremediation (from ancient Greek μύκης (mukēs), meaning "fungus", and the suffix -remedium, in Latin meaning 'restoring balance') is a form of bioremediation in which fungi-based remediation methods are used to decontaminate the environment. > Fungi have been proven to be a cheap, effective and environmentally sound way for removing a wide array of contaminants from damaged environments or wastewater. These contaminants include heavy metals, organic pollutants, textile dyes, leather tanning chemicals and wastewater, petroleum fuels, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, pharmaceuticals and personal care products, pesticides and herbicides in land, fresh water, and marine environments. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mycoremediation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mycoremediation

wolverine876 3y ago

> life on Earth will be around long after our species and its descendants cease to exist, to think otherwise is to prove one's ignorance. Who says otherwise?

medoc 3y ago
It's a common misconception that the reason we should be more frugal is to save the planet, ecosystems, or cute animals.
- mandmandam 3y ago
  What is the misconception? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocene_extinction We are killing species at 100-1,000 times the background rate. The damage can never be undone. The Earth may recover, on geological time scales, but 99.9% of those species aren't ever coming back. It's extremely unwise to be committing mass murder on the biosphere like this, and not a matter of "frugality".
- ceejayoz 3y ago
  “Save the planet” is a short slogan for “not have sentient cockroaches wondering what happened to the folks who dug up all the coal”. No one asserts climate change is gonna crack the planet in half.
- adammarples 3y ago
  Yeah, ecosystems are fragile, they're equilibria. Of course if you disrupt them you eventually get another one, but I'm quite fond of the ones we have and not looking forward to a cool fungi and jellyfish locust swarm ecosystem or whatever comes next.
- wolverine876 3y ago
  Personally, I think it's very important, and I think most people would agree, to prevent harm and cost to humans, and to enable them to be free, live long, and prosper. [0] I don't think there's a higher moral or practical imperative - if you don't care about that, what do you care about? The GGP said "life on Earth will be around long after our species and its descendants cease to exist", implying that the extinction of humans was not an issue! Damage to nature, as a general concept, can often shorten lives, cause great harm to the living (warfare, starvation), and cost enormous amounts of money - climate change is very expensive. One reason is that we have enormous amounts of fixed capital - 10,000 years worth, in a way - invested in the ecosystems as they currently are, including all our agriculture, ports, cities, infrastructure, borders, food and water supply, etc. etc. It will be very expensive and pointless to rebuild it all for new ecosystems instead of just retaining what we have. Also, most people agree that harming animals is also wrong, though not nearly on the level of harming humans. If you physically abuse your dog, for example, people will be angry and there are laws against it in most places. And I think most people value what is 'natural' to some degree; it seems like a common value of humanity across time and cultures. They prefer the natural hill to the strip-mined one, the green field to the parking lot. They also like coal and parking their car, so there are competing values too. [0] :)

CSMastermind 3y ago

The biology and evolutionary history of fungi is incredibly fascinating. To my (admittedly layman) understanding, they're sort of life's premiere resource extractors. Their whole thing is breaking down things that other life can't, so it's not surprising at all that some species can consume oil. We know they co-evolved with plants, and one theory suggests that fungi allowed plants to make the jump from water to land by using their hyphae to act as a proto-root system, unlock nutrients like phosphorus from the soil, and transport water, while early land plants provided sugars produced from photosynthesis in return. One of the main differentiations that might have led to the split between proto-fungi and proto-animals is their nutrient acquisition strategy. The organism that would become fungi had extracellular digestion, while the organism that would become animals captured and ingested other organisms. This split led to different approaches to cellular adhesion along with different developmental and signaling pathways (different strategies for achieving homeostasis for instance). --- If you want to read about some really wild stuff, look up the Late Paleozoic era in the Carboniferous period. Basically plants evolved Lignin (wood) but there was nothing in the world that could break it down so it rapidly accumulated along with a hyperoxgenated atmosphere due to the extensive growth. This meant there were 8 foot long millipedes and dragonflies that size of crows flying around. There were also massive forest fires spanning the globe since fire was one of the only ways to get rid of the lignin until, eventually, some fungi evolved to take care of the problem.

maxmalkav 3y ago
> Basically plants evolved Lignin (wood) but there was nothing in the world that could break it down so it rapidly accumulated along with a hyperoxgenated atmosphere due to the extensive growth. That was my understanding too until recently, when I have read in a couple of places that things might not have been like that. Checking the Wikipedia article about Carboniferous [1] it seems there is not consensus yet: "There is ongoing debate as to why this peak in the formation of Earth's coal deposits occurred during the Carboniferous. The first theory, known as the delayed fungal evolution hypothesis, is that a delay between the development of trees with the wood fibre lignin and the subsequent evolution of lignin-degrading fungi gave a period of time where vast amounts of lignin-based organic material could accumulate. Genetic analysis of basidiomycete fungi, which have enzymes capable of breaking down lignin, supports this theory by suggesting this fungi evolved in the Permian. However, significant Mesozoic and Cenozoic coal deposits formed after lignin-digesting fungi had become well established, and fungal degradation of lignin may have already evolved by the end of the Devonian, even if the specific enzymes used by basidiomycetes had not. The second theory is that the geographical setting and climate of the Carboniferous were unique in Earth's history: the co-occurrence of the position of the continents across the humid equatorial zone, high biological productivity, and the low-lying, water-logged and slowly subsiding sedimentary basins that allowed the thick accumulation of peat were sufficient to account for the peak in coal formation." One way or another, I find fascinating how different the planet has been along its geologic periods. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carboniferous#Coal_formation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carboniferous#Coal_formation

Shekelphile 3y ago

We are actually in the last 20% of time remaining for life on earth to exist. Multicellular life will likely go extinct within a few hundred million years.

whutsurnaym 3y ago
That's not information I'd heard before. Do you have a source?
- philipkglass 3y ago
  Not a "few" hundred million years, but less than a billion years: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_far_future#Earth,_the_Solar_System,_and_the_Universe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_far_future#Ear... 500-600 million years: The Sun's increasing luminosity begins to disrupt the carbonate–silicate cycle; higher luminosity increases weathering of surface rocks, which traps carbon dioxide in the ground as carbonate. As water evaporates from the Earth's surface, rocks harden, causing plate tectonics to slow and eventually stop once the oceans evaporate completely. With less volcanism to recycle carbon into the Earth's atmosphere, carbon dioxide levels begin to fall. By this time, carbon dioxide levels will fall to the point at which C3 photosynthesis is no longer possible. All plants that use C3 photosynthesis (≈99 percent of present-day species) will die. ... 800-900 million years: Carbon dioxide levels will fall to the point at which C4 photosynthesis is no longer possible. Without plant life to recycle oxygen in the atmosphere, free oxygen and the ozone layer will disappear from the atmosphere allowing for intense levels of deadly UV light to reach the surface. Animals in food chains that were dependent on live plants will disappear shortly afterward. At most, animal life could survive about 3 to 100 million years after plant life dies out. Just like plants, the extinction of animals will likely coincide with the loss of plants. It will start with large animals, then smaller animals and flying creatures, then amphibians, followed by reptiles, and finally, invertebrates. In the book The Life and Death of Planet Earth, authors Peter D. Ward and Donald Brownlee state that some animal life may be able to survive in the oceans. Eventually, however, all multicellular life will die out.
  - 3y ago

Log_out_ 3y ago

So encode human genomes into mushrooms, so we rise again? Great idea

hypercube33 3y ago
Wasn't that an episode of SG1 with the mushroom humanoids?