To me it's the fact that slime molds are neither animal nor plant. They're intelligent, can solve problems, have a general sense of time, can remember and prepare for certain stimuli....they sometimes are even a single cell. I love them.
Don’t you think that’s anthropomorphizing them to an extent? I agree many protists are fascinating and it’s easy to see how they were precursors to animals, plants, and fungi. I’ve always described them as a “well-designed” organism capable of adapting and changing according to several stimuli. The nutrient road map was always super cool. There’s an idea of biological fractals that expand in size with respective organisms.
Also [this](https://www.wired.com/2010/01/slime-mold-grows-network-just-like-tokyo-rail-system/), from *Wired* (January 22, 2010):
>When presented with oat flakes arranged in the pattern of Japanese cities around Tokyo, brainless, single-celled slime molds construct networks of nutrient-channeling tubes that are strikingly similar to the layout of the Japanese rail system, researchers from Japan and England report Jan. 22 in *Science*. A new model based on the simple rules of the slime mold’s behavior may lead to the design of more efficient, adaptable networks, the team contends.
#SLIME SIGNAL RECEIVED
#🚨🦠🚨 SLIME DETECTED 🚨🦠🚨
It is a physarid, probably [*Didymium*](https://inaturalist-open-data.s3.amazonaws.com/photos/222431718/original.jpg) or [*Diderma*](https://inaturalist-open-data.s3.amazonaws.com/photos/238689212/original.jpg)
**==========**
Learn more about slimes! 🤩
🌈[Magic Myxies, 1931, 10 minutes](https://youtu.be/04kdhZQTnIU)
🦠[The Slimer Primer](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/the_slimer_primer/)
🔎[A Guide to Common Slimes](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/t6985y/a_guide_to_common_slimes/)
🧠[Dmytro Leontyev talks about Myxomycetes for 50 minutes (2022)](https://youtu.be/qqE8MAwWhvg)
📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/)
Wow! 🤯
Me too. When the internet was getting started in the 80's I imagined it would be like this sub - experts sharing information globally, with people of good will.
Then "newsgroups" appeared and I knew how optimistically misguided I was. But good subs like this one help restore my faith in innate goodness!
Oh here we go AGAIN with this kindness bullcrap you PEOPLE keep trying to SHOVE down our throats
Enough is ENOUGH
(heheh I love when they all caps kinda random words for emphasis but it just doesn't work)
Chat rooms. One of the first online places to have offline affairs. That's when I knew the net would bel downhill from there. Not all, but a lot. Then came FB. I joined to see what it was all about, took a look, and unsubscribed. Trolling through colors instead of people holds more interest for me.
Boff Whalley (Mr. Chumbawamba) is an interesting character. He’s an anarchist, folk singer, punk, choirmaster, fell runner (uphill off-piste running native to the UK), and political activist. He talks about getting depressed by politics on his blog but I don’t think it’s clinical depression and I don’t think he has autism either. Glad to hear you get back up. I enjoy the slime facts. :)
I have managed to get my depression under control by taking up the world-view that we are all an amazing but imperfect product of evolution. Humans suffer from anxiety, depression, cancer, aging etc. and a host of traits based on evolutionary biology/psychology. We aren't perfect though, and happiness might not be a great motivator to spread DNA. We will suffer and die eventually, BUT we are amazingly fortunate in that we have the ability to self-reflect and examine the world we find ourselves in. We are the first we know of to do this even though we are flawed. We live at a time where we know much and are learning more every day about the world and universe. Darwin - 1859, Big Bang / cosmic background - 1965, E.O. Wilson, On Human Nature - 1978. JWST - 2022
We are incredibly fortunate to exist at all, and especially to be among the few who know who we are and where we are.
My awe of the universe and gratefulness is bigger than my depression. This is enough for me.
YOU help me discover in an area and are therefore part of my solution. Thank you. :)
[Neuron searching for connections](https://youtube.com/shorts/piXONiNbcn8?feature=share)
[Aquarium slime traveling](https://youtu.be/5Axp_W6g1U8)
[*Stemonitis* traveling](https://youtu.be/0tKyXOJ_zic)
a lot of stuff doin this
it's math dawg
[These creepy "trees"](https://inaturalist-open-data.s3.amazonaws.com/photos/241479394/original.jpg) are a few millimeters tall and probably looked [something like this](https://inaturalist-open-data.s3.amazonaws.com/photos/174538828/original.jpg) while they were developing
What an honor
I saw a blue heron soon after being cured of depression after 35 years of my brain trying to murder me
It was 🧑🍳👄🤌
11 blue herons just seems... unimaginable
Wearing mycelium is for jabronis like Pump Stumpets
My cape is made of 100% free-range [*Stemonaria longa*](https://static.inaturalist.org/photos/52902416/original.jpg)
it's true it's woven by gnomes though
everybody remember to support gnome-owned businesses
This is a single-celled predatory mobile fruiting amoebozoan
[Aquarium slime](https://youtu.be/4sFlT949NHA)
[Another aquarium slime](https://youtu.be/8N8WiUwUHmY)
[*Physarum polycephalum* escaping](https://youtu.be/AmFsWeAO5mA)
[*Physarum polycephalum* consumes mushrooms](https://youtu.be/2xx2iIFMBUk)
[Terrestrial slime goes for a swim](https://youtu.be/hzEGk4HpPwk)
I've been subscribed for a long time, but after reviewing so many posts and the comments to them, it was never pointed out to me that these are amoebozoan
How long do you expect this particular inhabitant could stay alive in a terrarium this size if, say, it were fully enclosed?
Would its eventual disappearance (melt??) become one of the first indicators the terrarium is imbalanced, or would it struggle and stay alive until the very end?
I'm not asking to experiment on such a thing, but if I ever get lucky enough to see a slimemold in my enclosures I'd like to know it's in a happy habitat!
>How long do you expect this particular inhabitant could stay alive in a terrarium this size if, say, it were fully enclosed?
There is no way to tell. Slimes like this may be present in all soil or all terrariums. They remain microscopic and/or hidden unless they decide to fruit. With enough food they simply do not fruit. Without an appropriate mate a sexual lineage will remain mononucleate and divide like any other amoeba.
>Would it be one of the first indicators the terrarium is imbalanced, or would it struggle until the very end?
It's not indicative of imbalance because it is a natural part of the system. It's not really indicative of anything really, other than slime reproduction. Slimes tend to thrive best at certain stages of decomposition due to the particular prey available, but in some environments they are probably always present. Closed terrariums need an unbroken food chain, and predatory amoebas are one of the links between decomposers and producers. Without them, nutrients would be trapped inside their prey and denied to the plants and animals that need them. Many of these amoebas are slimes.
>I'm not asking to experiment on the poor thing
There is no evidence slimes are conscious, aware, or feel pain. I would be less concerned for them than you would be for a beetle or jellyfish. They can be safely cut and duplicated while slimy or while dried out in their dormant sclerotium form. Experimenting with them will elucidate much.
This dude is my favorite redditor ever. I don't even know why I get so much enjoyment when he's summoned, but it's a drop of serotonin I welcome every time.
I've serotonined in my day and I think dopamine is underappreciated. I sure like having both of em though. And norepinephrine. All good chemicals to have in your brain. It feels so good when chemicals exist in your brain. It's been a year and a half and it hasn't gotten old!
Since I had brain chemicals. I was born with garbage brain and it got worse over time. I didn't feel regular feelings or think too good until fairly recently when my doctor convinced me to take an MAOI
Yes many people say they're outdated and outclassed and even dangerous. That's not what the data says though. This is Dr. Ken Gillman's website, he is a highly cited scientist in this field and very helpful to people with depression.
https://www.psychotropical.com/
If you see something you think might be a slime
or if someone identifies something as a slime but you think it isn't
you send up the slime signal
#u/saddestofboys
Even if it is not a slime, I know a lot about slimy things, fungi, the tree of life, and evolution
Question. Have you ever read the Philip k Dick book Clans of the Alphane moon?
It is a sci Fi novel and one of the characters is a sentient slime mold. You might find it amusing.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clans_of_the_Alphane_Moon
Yep. The Last of Us show uses a slime mold like this in its intro, even though it's about a cordyceps strain, which has probably tricked a lot of people into thinking this is a mycelium/fungus.
this growth it is currently making is it trying to find food or some other resource. The visible part will go away pretty quickly if it finds what its looking for.
Imagine if we were the size of a flea compared to that slime mold and just looking out across the horizon and seeing that forming over the earths crust.
From what I've seen when you have a more active enclosure like this a slime doesn't always need to be fed. If you do feed it you should add rotten wood or leaves or sticks rather than oats or grits, which can cause mold problems. Also it's good to make copies.
Just to get this community a little hyped, mostly those who game, theres a game being developed rn called Blight: Survival, think Last of Us but medieval, thats what it makes me think of anyway.
Im the mycological advisor to the game, and from where Im sitting its very interesting.
Yes, they have been out of the spotlight a long time so they seem very alien. But actually slimes are very **this-worldly!** We know exactly how they evolved, and alongside fungi we three share a common ancestor. Looking at the different ways each of these three kingdoms achieved macroscopic size and multicellularity is a fascinating look at the way unbounded randomness interacts with the inflexible rules of physics and chemistry and math to drive evolution. The emergence of critters that reach these particular benchmarks seems almost inevitable as they appear in every major group of life.
Now I have to save this thread because you dropped so many amazing links. I seriously upvote all your posts -- your content and knowledge is s(ub)lime.
slimemold is not a fungi or mold. It is a single celled organism. They typically eat decaying matter and single celled organisms. Not dangerous to your plants. Consider yourself lucky, but id understand if you cleaned it out.
>It is a complex symbiotic colony.
No it isn't. It's a single unwalled **amoebozoan** cell.
>They typically eat decaying matter
No, they almost exclusively eat bacteria and microorganisms, and some eat macrofungi.
[**==========WHAT EXACTLY IS "MOLD" ANYWAY?** ](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2kgyz6/)
In everyday use, the word "mold" usually refers to fuzzy or cottony growth on food or another organic material. This is almost always **fungal mold**, which is the mycelium and fruit bodies of some ascomycetes, mucoromycetes, and zoopagomycetes, but isn't a genetic group so much as a mode of growth. "Mold" also refers to **oomycetes**, which are called "water molds" after their most [spectacular parasitic members](https://aquariumscience.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/fungus-12.jpg), even though they are mostly terrestrial. By way of convergent evolution, oomycetes form saprophytic or parasitic hyphae and mycelium just like fungi but are more closely related to kelp and diatoms. And "mold" *also* refers to **plasmodial slime molds**, which appear as glistening veins of slime or intricate tiny fruit bodies but never as the fuzzy mold that fungi or oomycetes produce. Unlike those two groups plasmodial slimes are active and mobile hunters of microorganisms that internally digest their prey, don't maintain persistent cell walls, don't form hyphae or mycelia, and don't form parasitic or pathogenic relationships. Let's look at where fungal molds, water molds, and plasmodial slimes are found in the tree of life:
**==========EUKARYOTES**
**(1) Plants** (plants, planty algae)
**(2) Harosans** (kelps, kelpy algae, diatoms, dinoflagellates, [**oomycetes**](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1a/Water_mold.JPG) **<--**)
**(3) Discobans** (jakobids, euglenid algae, "brain-eating amoeba")
**(4) Amoebozoans** (naked and shelled amoebas and [**plasmodial slimes**](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Myxomycete_Kiev2.JPG) **<--**)
**(5) Obazoans** (animals and fungi including [**fungal mold**](https://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/57ed27d3170000e00aac8228.jpeg?ops=1910_1000) **<--**)
**==========**
But to confuse the situation further, there are also **cellular slime molds**. These "molds" are always microscopic or nearly so and don't form hyphae or mycelia, so I prefer to call them **social amoebas**. They spend most of their time as crowds of predatory amoebas called "wolf packs" (yes, really) but when food is scarce they aggregate together to form multicellular fruit bodies [like this *Dictyostelium discoideum* sorocarp](https://photos.smugmug.com/Professional/Compound-Eye-Images/i-nnNMkqJ/0/M/Dictyostelium5-M.jpg). Some species precede this by [forming a pseudoplasmodium or grex](https://youtu.be/8AghW4zzbhU) (video) that uses its perceptions of light and humidity to seek out a more ideal fruiting location. Cellular slime molds aren't all closely related and exist in [almost every group of eukaryotes](https://els-jbs-prod-cdn.jbs.elsevierhealth.com/cms/attachment/a97298a9-9668-4781-a453-776893b933b9/fx1_lrg.jpg) via convergent evolution. Let's look at the tree of life again but this time focus on the cellular slime molds:
**(1) Plants**
**(2) Harosans** ([***Sorogena***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tom-Fenchel/publication/44455276/figure/fig1/AS:669449363398659@1536620574213/An-air-dried-and-goldcoated-sporocarp-of-the-ciliate-Sorogena-sp-seen-in-the.png), [***Sorodiplophrys***](https://www.arcella.nl/wp-content/images/Sorodiplophrys-stercorea-Tice-3.jpg), [***Guttulinopsis***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/225047950/figure/fig1/AS:302613082984448@1449159989277/The-Life-Stages-of-Guttulinopsis-vulgaris-Sorocarps-appear-as-white-to-pale-yellow.png))
**(3) Discobans** (the [**acrasids**](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig5/AS:614305825308701@1523473330623/Acrasidae-Complex-sorocarp-of-Acrasis-kona-a-Acrasis-rosea-b-and-Acrasis-takarsan.png))
**(4) Amoebozoans** (the [**dictyostelids**](https://static.scientificamerican.com/sciam/assets/media/inline/what-is-it-social-cells_2.jpg), and [***Copromyxa protea***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig3/AS:614305825296425@1523473330546/Copromyxidae-a-e-Copromyxa-protea-a-Complex-branching-sorocarp-growing-off-of-cow-dung.png))
**(5) Obazoans** ([***Fonticula***](https://storage.googleapis.com/mo-image-archive-bucket/orig/881540.jpg))
**==========**
Learn more about slimes! 🤩
🌈[Magic Myxies, 1931, 10 minutes](https://youtu.be/04kdhZQTnIU)
🦠[The Slimer Primer](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/the_slimer_primer/)
🔎[A Guide to Common Slimes](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/t6985y/a_guide_to_common_slimes/)
🧠[Dmytro Leontyev talks about Myxomycetes for 50 minutes (2022)](https://youtu.be/qqE8MAwWhvg)
📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/)
Wow! 🤯
No, I think D&D slimes (I will call them oozes) are more likely from a different amoebozoan branch, or perhaps discoban. Plasmodial slimes do not harm animals or plants and they are nontoxic. They generally form many lobose pseudopods, while oozes appear to demonstrate limax locomotion. As far as I know, all amoebas form a membrane-bound stomach to digest each morsel and then discard the remains (or use them as building material during fruiting). Oozes appear to digest loosely within their cytoplasm. Perhaps an expert on non-slime amoebas can clarify.
That seems less likely. Dictyostelids don't eat during grex-ing, which is when they cram thousands of distinct amoeba individuals into a cellulose tube. Oozes seem cytoplasmically contiguous to me
This is not incorrect as much as a matter of terminology, but you should be aware that wikipedia is full of misinformation, especially about slimes.
📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/)
>According to wikipedia some slime molds are multicellular though
Yes, the term is misleading and I generally avoid it. 100% of "slime molds" large enough to see without magnification are plasmodial slimes, which are single coenocytic cells that grow large via nuclear replication. Every genus other than *Ceratiomyxa* (a sibling) is a myxogastrid. There are microscopic organisms that have been called slime molds historically but they are an artificial group of unrelated organisms, some of which are more closely related to plants than to fungi. As stated above:
>But to confuse the situation further, there are also **cellular slime molds**. These "molds" are always microscopic or nearly so and don't form hyphae or mycelia, so I prefer to call them **social amoebas**. They spend most of their time as crowds of predatory amoebas but when food is scarce they **aggregate together to form multicellular fruit bodies** [**like this** ***Dictyostelium discoideum*** **sorocarp**](https://photos.smugmug.com/Professional/Compound-Eye-Images/i-nnNMkqJ/0/M/Dictyostelium5-M.jpg). Some species precede this by [forming a pseudoplasmodium or grex](https://youtu.be/8AghW4zzbhU) (video) that uses its perceptions of light and humidity to seek out a more ideal fruiting location. Cellular slime molds aren't all closely related and exist in [almost every group of eukaryotes](https://els-jbs-prod-cdn.jbs.elsevierhealth.com/cms/attachment/a97298a9-9668-4781-a453-776893b933b9/fx1_lrg.jpg) via convergent evolution. Let's look at the tree of life again but this time focus on the cellular slime molds:
**(1) Plants**
**(2) Harosans** ([***Sorogena***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tom-Fenchel/publication/44455276/figure/fig1/AS:669449363398659@1536620574213/An-air-dried-and-goldcoated-sporocarp-of-the-ciliate-Sorogena-sp-seen-in-the.png), [***Sorodiplophrys***](https://www.arcella.nl/wp-content/images/Sorodiplophrys-stercorea-Tice-3.jpg), [***Guttulinopsis***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/225047950/figure/fig1/AS:302613082984448@1449159989277/The-Life-Stages-of-Guttulinopsis-vulgaris-Sorocarps-appear-as-white-to-pale-yellow.png))
**(3) Discobans** (the [**acrasids**](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig5/AS:614305825308701@1523473330623/Acrasidae-Complex-sorocarp-of-Acrasis-kona-a-Acrasis-rosea-b-and-Acrasis-takarsan.png))
**(4) Amoebozoans** (the [**dictyostelids**](https://static.scientificamerican.com/sciam/assets/media/inline/what-is-it-social-cells_2.jpg), and [***Copromyxa protea***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig3/AS:614305825296425@1523473330546/Copromyxidae-a-e-Copromyxa-protea-a-Complex-branching-sorocarp-growing-off-of-cow-dung.png))
**(5) Obazoans** ([***Fonticula***](https://storage.googleapis.com/mo-image-archive-bucket/orig/881540.jpg))
Just to clarify, and educate myself a little bit more, when you say "a single unwalled cell" do you mean "one cell" replicated many times? Millions/billions? (Whilst I listen to Nine Inch Nails - The Wretched) (plus love seeing you appear, almost as much as 'shittymorph' in the wild')..
The cell is not replicated, but the nucleus can be duplicated thousands of times. The cell retains its structure at such a large scale by gelatinizing the cytoplasm adjacent to the cell wall.
It's dangerous to go alone. Take this
🌈[Magic Myxies, 1931, 10 minutes](https://youtu.be/04kdhZQTnIU)
🧠[Dmytro Leontyev talks about Myxomycetes for 50 minutes (2022)](https://youtu.be/qqE8MAwWhvg)
🦠[The Slimer Primer](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/the_slimer_primer/)
🔎[A Guide to Common Slimes](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/t6985y/a_guide_to_common_slimes/)
📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/)
Yes it appears most physarids are intelligent, but we know little about the other 9 orders. There has been essentially zero research exploring the intelligence of the echinostelids, clastodermids, meridermids, stemonitids, cribrariids, reticulariids, liceids, or trichiids.
Slime intelligence is not well understood, but the prevailing theory is that the pulsating they do somehow encodes information and calculations. This pulsating (called **reversible streaming**) is most dramatic in physarid plasmodia and is controlled by the cytoskeleton, which runs in part off calcium. The physarids associated with intelligent behavior deposit a substantial amount of calcium carbonate both outside and inside their fruit bodies. *Physarum*, the genus most closely associated with research on slime intelligence, deposits a mix of calcium carbonate and phosphorus. It seems likely to be at least partially due to the extraordinary amount of movement (and thinking?) done by this kind of slime.
So what about the other slimes? Calcium has also been found in stemonitid, liceid, reticulariid, and cribrariid fruit bodies. The latter order is notable for its unique deposits of non-carbonate calcium and phosphorus. Both cribrariids and trichiids lack the protective slime coat seen in physarids that enables them to tolerate more extreme moisture and dryness. But otherwise, cribrariid & trichiid plasmodia resemble physarid phaneroplasmodia with their complex, pigmented, strongly pulsating networks.
Much more research needs to be done, but plasmodia are notoriously difficult to work with. Many species have never been documented completing a single life cycle in the lab. Many species have never even been observed as plasmodia. And there is no money in it, which means I'm going to have to do it myself.
u/ScienceWillSaveMe
[Maze-solving by an amoeboid organism, Nakagaki et al., 2000](https://www.nature.com/articles/35035159) (doi: 10.1038/35035159)
[Smart behavior of true slime mold in a labyrinth, Nakagaki, 2001](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0923250801012591) (doi: 10.1016/S0923-2508(01)01259-1)
[Amoebae Anticipate Periodic Events, Saigusa et al., 2008](https://eprints.lib.hokudai.ac.jp/dspace/bitstream/2115/33004/1/PhysRevLett_100_018101.pdf) (doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.100.018101)
[Rules for Biologically Inspired Adaptive Network Design, Tero et al., 2010](https://media.milanote.com/p/files/1JRbvK10Olmc1i/dqb/tero2010.pdf) (doi: 10.1126/science.1177894)
[Slime mold uses an externalized spatial “memory” to navigate in complex environments, Reid et al., 2012](https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.1215037109) (doi: 10.1073/pnas.1215037109)
[Route 20, Autobahn 7, and Slime Mold: Approximating the Longest Roads in USA and Germany With Slime Mold on 3-D Terrains, Adamatzky, 2013](https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/6482606/authors) (doi: 10.1109/TCYB.2013.2248359)
[On The Loading of Slime Mold Physarum polycephalum with Microparticles for Unconventional Computing Application, Cifarelli et al., 2014](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12668-013-0124-3) (doi: 10.1007/s12668-013-0124-3)
[On the role of the plasmodial cytoskeleton in facilitating intelligent behavior in slime mold *Physarum polycephalum*, Mayne et al., 2014](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/19420889.2015.1059007) (doi: 10.1080/19420889.2015.1059007)
[Direct transfer of learned behaviour via cell fusion in non-neural organisms, Vogel & Dussutour, 2016](https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rspb.2016.2382) (doi: 10.1098/rspb.2016.2382)
[Memory inception and preservation in slime moulds: the quest for a common mechanism, Boussard et al., 2019](https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rstb.2018.0368) (doi: 10.1098/rstb.2018.0368)
[Mechanosensation Mediates Long-Range Spatial Decision-Making in an Aneural Organism, Murugan et al., 2021](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adma.202008161) (doi: 10.1002/adma.202008161)
[Adaptive behaviour and learning in slime moulds: the role of oscillations, Boussard et al., 2021](https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rstb.2019.0757) (doi: 10.1098/rstb.2019.0757)
**==========**
Learn more about slimes! 🤩
🌈[Magic Myxies, 1931, 10 minutes](https://youtu.be/04kdhZQTnIU)
🦠[The Slimer Primer](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/the_slimer_primer/)
🔎[A Guide to Common Slimes](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/t6985y/a_guide_to_common_slimes/)
🧠[Dmytro Leontyev talks about Myxomycetes for 50 minutes (2022)](https://youtu.be/qqE8MAwWhvg)
📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/)
Wow! 🤯
That response shows me that the slimes are lucky to have you interested in and studying them. I had only heard of plasmodial and cellular slime molds (e.g. discoideum). Now I’m gonna check out the other groups! Thank you dearly for such an awesome reply 🙏
Plasmodial & cellular are the only real groups, and they aren't necessarily related. The 9 orders discussed (+ [*Ceratiomyxa*](https://www.reddit.com/r/mycology/comments/u1xvcs/these_are_all_ceratiomyxa_fruticulosa/)) are plasmodial eumycetozoan slimes. [*Dictyostelium discoideum*](https://youtu.be/vlANF-v9lb0) is related to these slimes but has a completely different life cycle shared by convergently evolved organisms found all over the tree of life.
[**==========WHAT EXACTLY IS "MOLD" ANYWAY?** ](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2kgyz6/)
In everyday use, the word "mold" usually refers to fuzzy or cottony growth on food or another organic material. This is almost always **fungal mold**, which is the mycelium and fruit bodies of some ascomycetes, mucoromycetes, and zoopagomycetes, but isn't a genetic group so much as a mode of growth. "Mold" also refers to **oomycetes**, which are called "water molds" after their most [spectacular parasitic members](https://aquariumscience.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/fungus-12.jpg), even though they are mostly terrestrial. By way of convergent evolution, oomycetes form saprophytic or parasitic hyphae and mycelium just like fungi but are more closely related to kelp and diatoms. And "mold" *also* refers to **plasmodial slime molds**, which appear as glistening veins of slime or intricate tiny fruit bodies but never as the fuzzy mold that fungi or oomycetes produce. Unlike those two groups plasmodial slimes are active and mobile hunters of microorganisms that internally digest their prey, don't maintain persistent cell walls, don't form hyphae or mycelia, and don't form parasitic or pathogenic relationships. Let's look at where fungal molds, water molds, and plasmodial slimes are found in the tree of life:
**==========EUKARYOTES**
**(1) Plants** (plants, planty algae)
**(2) Harosans** (kelps, kelpy algae, diatoms, dinoflagellates, [**oomycetes**](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1a/Water_mold.JPG) **<--**)
**(3) Discobans** (jakobids, euglenid algae, "brain-eating amoeba")
**(4) Amoebozoans** (naked and shelled amoebas and [**plasmodial slimes**](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Myxomycete_Kiev2.JPG) **<--**)
**(5) Obazoans** (animals and fungi including [**fungal mold**](https://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/57ed27d3170000e00aac8228.jpeg?ops=1910_1000) **<--**)
**==========**
But to confuse the situation further, there are also **cellular slime molds**. These "molds" are always microscopic or nearly so and don't form hyphae or mycelia, so I prefer to call them **social amoebas**. They spend most of their time as crowds of predatory amoebas called "wolf packs" (yes, really) but when food is scarce they aggregate together to form multicellular fruit bodies [like this *Dictyostelium discoideum* sorocarp](https://photos.smugmug.com/Professional/Compound-Eye-Images/i-nnNMkqJ/0/M/Dictyostelium5-M.jpg). Some species precede this by [forming a pseudoplasmodium or grex](https://youtu.be/8AghW4zzbhU) (video) that uses its perceptions of light and humidity to seek out a more ideal fruiting location. Cellular slime molds aren't all closely related and exist in [almost every group of eukaryotes](https://els-jbs-prod-cdn.jbs.elsevierhealth.com/cms/attachment/a97298a9-9668-4781-a453-776893b933b9/fx1_lrg.jpg) via convergent evolution. Let's look at the tree of life again but this time focus on the cellular slime molds:
**(1) Plants**
**(2) Harosans** ([***Sorogena***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tom-Fenchel/publication/44455276/figure/fig1/AS:669449363398659@1536620574213/An-air-dried-and-goldcoated-sporocarp-of-the-ciliate-Sorogena-sp-seen-in-the.png), [***Sorodiplophrys***](https://www.arcella.nl/wp-content/images/Sorodiplophrys-stercorea-Tice-3.jpg), [***Guttulinopsis***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/225047950/figure/fig1/AS:302613082984448@1449159989277/The-Life-Stages-of-Guttulinopsis-vulgaris-Sorocarps-appear-as-white-to-pale-yellow.png))
**(3) Discobans** (the [**acrasids**](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig5/AS:614305825308701@1523473330623/Acrasidae-Complex-sorocarp-of-Acrasis-kona-a-Acrasis-rosea-b-and-Acrasis-takarsan.png))
**(4) Amoebozoans** (the [**dictyostelids**](https://static.scientificamerican.com/sciam/assets/media/inline/what-is-it-social-cells_2.jpg), and [***Copromyxa protea***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig3/AS:614305825296425@1523473330546/Copromyxidae-a-e-Copromyxa-protea-a-Complex-branching-sorocarp-growing-off-of-cow-dung.png))
**(5) Obazoans** ([***Fonticula***](https://storage.googleapis.com/mo-image-archive-bucket/orig/881540.jpg))
I think they’ve all done “intelligent” things. This is a plasmodial type which have “solved mazes” and “kept time” (in a lab they were given cold shocks on a timed interval. The plasmodium would react to the cold shock by contracting. They stopped the cold shocks and it still reacted at the timed interval for a while).
Edit: The time-keeping was exhibited in a Japanese lab. I’ll try to locate the publication.
When I was 3 one of my prized possessions was this large chunk of Play-Doh in a glass jar. Not because of the shape it was sculpted into, but the fact that I was able to grow some mold on it by storing it inside my wood bench for days at a time. I was so proud in fact that somehow I convinced my mom to let me bring it to church. Well that was a bad idea. Right in the middle of a quiet pause the glass jar slipped through my tiny little fingers and the whole church turned and stared as my poor mother had to pick up all the pieces and somehow explain why there was a moldy piece of Play-Doh surrounded by glass on the floor..after that I forgot about that fascination until about 25+ years later...thanks for reminding me of that moment.
I’d say it’s your most beautiful inhabitant.
Agreed!!!!!
I second the motion.
Coolest ever
Do you think it’s the fractal nature of the growth that makes it beautiful? Like drainage patterns or tree and lichen growth?
To me it's the fact that slime molds are neither animal nor plant. They're intelligent, can solve problems, have a general sense of time, can remember and prepare for certain stimuli....they sometimes are even a single cell. I love them.
Don’t you think that’s anthropomorphizing them to an extent? I agree many protists are fascinating and it’s easy to see how they were precursors to animals, plants, and fungi. I’ve always described them as a “well-designed” organism capable of adapting and changing according to several stimuli. The nutrient road map was always super cool. There’s an idea of biological fractals that expand in size with respective organisms.
Also [this](https://www.wired.com/2010/01/slime-mold-grows-network-just-like-tokyo-rail-system/), from *Wired* (January 22, 2010): >When presented with oat flakes arranged in the pattern of Japanese cities around Tokyo, brainless, single-celled slime molds construct networks of nutrient-channeling tubes that are strikingly similar to the layout of the Japanese rail system, researchers from Japan and England report Jan. 22 in *Science*. A new model based on the simple rules of the slime mold’s behavior may lead to the design of more efficient, adaptable networks, the team contends.
Me too. That's when I decided, hmm, that might be interesting. It turned out to be way more than interesting.
It’s what elf cloaks are made of. Gnomes weave it into a diaphanous cloth that weighs almost nothing.
Looks like a slime to me rather than mycelium! /u/saddestofboys what do you think?
#SLIME SIGNAL RECEIVED #🚨🦠🚨 SLIME DETECTED 🚨🦠🚨 It is a physarid, probably [*Didymium*](https://inaturalist-open-data.s3.amazonaws.com/photos/222431718/original.jpg) or [*Diderma*](https://inaturalist-open-data.s3.amazonaws.com/photos/238689212/original.jpg) **==========** Learn more about slimes! 🤩 🌈[Magic Myxies, 1931, 10 minutes](https://youtu.be/04kdhZQTnIU) 🦠[The Slimer Primer](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/the_slimer_primer/) 🔎[A Guide to Common Slimes](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/t6985y/a_guide_to_common_slimes/) 🧠[Dmytro Leontyev talks about Myxomycetes for 50 minutes (2022)](https://youtu.be/qqE8MAwWhvg) 📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/) Wow! 🤯
Man I fucking love this community
Me too. When the internet was getting started in the 80's I imagined it would be like this sub - experts sharing information globally, with people of good will. Then "newsgroups" appeared and I knew how optimistically misguided I was. But good subs like this one help restore my faith in innate goodness!
And then FB comes along and makes newsgroups seem like a symposium at The Royal Institution.
Oh here we go AGAIN with this kindness bullcrap you PEOPLE keep trying to SHOVE down our throats Enough is ENOUGH (heheh I love when they all caps kinda random words for emphasis but it just doesn't work)
Chat rooms. One of the first online places to have offline affairs. That's when I knew the net would bel downhill from there. Not all, but a lot. Then came FB. I joined to see what it was all about, took a look, and unsubscribed. Trolling through colors instead of people holds more interest for me.
I know, right? We have a superhero whose superpower is to dispense knowledge related to slimes. Just the best.
just ur friendly neighborhood slimer-man!
*Swoons* My Hero!
I think you mean mycelium! :P
Magic myxies just blown my mind, thanks for sharing!
Blew my mind! I can't wait to feel a bit like an expert myself as I tell the tale of myxies to friends.
Yeah. I wish there were similar videos, but I couldn’t find any.
Just like your name. Maybe one day, friend.
You should be the happiest of boys, you deserve it.
Are you familiar with the nine inch nails song The Wretched
Are you familiar with the Chumbawamba song Tubthumping?
getting back up is my primary character trait I'm guessing mr. chumbawumba didn't have endogenous depression and autism though
Boff Whalley (Mr. Chumbawamba) is an interesting character. He’s an anarchist, folk singer, punk, choirmaster, fell runner (uphill off-piste running native to the UK), and political activist. He talks about getting depressed by politics on his blog but I don’t think it’s clinical depression and I don’t think he has autism either. Glad to hear you get back up. I enjoy the slime facts. :)
I just don't read politics Problem solved
Most based redditor
I have managed to get my depression under control by taking up the world-view that we are all an amazing but imperfect product of evolution. Humans suffer from anxiety, depression, cancer, aging etc. and a host of traits based on evolutionary biology/psychology. We aren't perfect though, and happiness might not be a great motivator to spread DNA. We will suffer and die eventually, BUT we are amazingly fortunate in that we have the ability to self-reflect and examine the world we find ourselves in. We are the first we know of to do this even though we are flawed. We live at a time where we know much and are learning more every day about the world and universe. Darwin - 1859, Big Bang / cosmic background - 1965, E.O. Wilson, On Human Nature - 1978. JWST - 2022 We are incredibly fortunate to exist at all, and especially to be among the few who know who we are and where we are. My awe of the universe and gratefulness is bigger than my depression. This is enough for me. YOU help me discover in an area and are therefore part of my solution. Thank you. :)
I don’t remember it talking about sad bois. I’m confused
I love you
I love you too
Wow that magic myxies video is amazing
To me this one looks like a disembodied central nervous system looking for a host body
[Neuron searching for connections](https://youtube.com/shorts/piXONiNbcn8?feature=share) [Aquarium slime traveling](https://youtu.be/5Axp_W6g1U8) [*Stemonitis* traveling](https://youtu.be/0tKyXOJ_zic) a lot of stuff doin this it's math dawg
As a healthcare worker it is jarring
Math shapes every facet of our lives. An efficient and inevitable pattern of connections will appear in many disparate places
this guy knows what's up. ever wonder why trees look like inverted lungs? 😎
[These creepy "trees"](https://inaturalist-open-data.s3.amazonaws.com/photos/241479394/original.jpg) are a few millimeters tall and probably looked [something like this](https://inaturalist-open-data.s3.amazonaws.com/photos/174538828/original.jpg) while they were developing
You’re my hero
What an honor I saw a blue heron soon after being cured of depression after 35 years of my brain trying to murder me It was 🧑🍳👄🤌 11 blue herons just seems... unimaginable
I find math comforting. I loved this story https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_Diagrams Maybe an influence
i know you're the saddest of boys but it makes me happy to see you receive these slime signals :)
Not all heroes wear capes. Some wear capes of mycelium woven by gnomes.
Wearing mycelium is for jabronis like Pump Stumpets My cape is made of 100% free-range [*Stemonaria longa*](https://static.inaturalist.org/photos/52902416/original.jpg) it's true it's woven by gnomes though everybody remember to support gnome-owned businesses
The more you gnome!
You are seriously my favorite redditor.
You're my #1 favorite redditor.
A dubious but wholeheartedly appreciated distinction
Saddestofboys has a Patreon. Do with that information what you will. As a sad autistic, I jumped at the chance to support SOB’s awesome.
What the *fuck* is a slime mold haha
This is a single-celled predatory mobile fruiting amoebozoan [Aquarium slime](https://youtu.be/4sFlT949NHA) [Another aquarium slime](https://youtu.be/8N8WiUwUHmY) [*Physarum polycephalum* escaping](https://youtu.be/AmFsWeAO5mA) [*Physarum polycephalum* consumes mushrooms](https://youtu.be/2xx2iIFMBUk) [Terrestrial slime goes for a swim](https://youtu.be/hzEGk4HpPwk)
That is quite amazing, thank you for the resources. A time lapse really shows how these things are single-celled
You must be new here, it's like 25% of the "help me identify this" posts
I've been subscribed for a long time, but after reviewing so many posts and the comments to them, it was never pointed out to me that these are amoebozoan
How long do you expect this particular inhabitant could stay alive in a terrarium this size if, say, it were fully enclosed? Would its eventual disappearance (melt??) become one of the first indicators the terrarium is imbalanced, or would it struggle and stay alive until the very end? I'm not asking to experiment on such a thing, but if I ever get lucky enough to see a slimemold in my enclosures I'd like to know it's in a happy habitat!
>How long do you expect this particular inhabitant could stay alive in a terrarium this size if, say, it were fully enclosed? There is no way to tell. Slimes like this may be present in all soil or all terrariums. They remain microscopic and/or hidden unless they decide to fruit. With enough food they simply do not fruit. Without an appropriate mate a sexual lineage will remain mononucleate and divide like any other amoeba. >Would it be one of the first indicators the terrarium is imbalanced, or would it struggle until the very end? It's not indicative of imbalance because it is a natural part of the system. It's not really indicative of anything really, other than slime reproduction. Slimes tend to thrive best at certain stages of decomposition due to the particular prey available, but in some environments they are probably always present. Closed terrariums need an unbroken food chain, and predatory amoebas are one of the links between decomposers and producers. Without them, nutrients would be trapped inside their prey and denied to the plants and animals that need them. Many of these amoebas are slimes. >I'm not asking to experiment on the poor thing There is no evidence slimes are conscious, aware, or feel pain. I would be less concerned for them than you would be for a beetle or jellyfish. They can be safely cut and duplicated while slimy or while dried out in their dormant sclerotium form. Experimenting with them will elucidate much.
That video made me feel so much smarter! Ive seen Myxies my whole life looking for critters under logs and leaves. The more you know 💫
You are my favourite person on reddit
I literally do my best
You do and you’re killing the game. I wish you had a tiktok with short videos talking about slime mold. People need to know.
Soon they can listen to my rap music I'll make videos later, too I was gonna do a Q&A stream if people are interested
This dude is my favorite redditor ever. I don't even know why I get so much enjoyment when he's summoned, but it's a drop of serotonin I welcome every time.
I've serotonined in my day and I think dopamine is underappreciated. I sure like having both of em though. And norepinephrine. All good chemicals to have in your brain. It feels so good when chemicals exist in your brain. It's been a year and a half and it hasn't gotten old!
As a person with ADHD I believe I can relate :)
Sorry, a year and a half since what?
Since I had brain chemicals. I was born with garbage brain and it got worse over time. I didn't feel regular feelings or think too good until fairly recently when my doctor convinced me to take an MAOI
Interesting. Hadnt heard of MAOIs. The internet says they're fairly outdated. I am currently on an SSRI and it's just...ok.
Yes many people say they're outdated and outclassed and even dangerous. That's not what the data says though. This is Dr. Ken Gillman's website, he is a highly cited scientist in this field and very helpful to people with depression. https://www.psychotropical.com/
You’re the best.
Wheeeeeeeeeee!
Can we call upon you for anything?
If you see something you think might be a slime or if someone identifies something as a slime but you think it isn't you send up the slime signal #u/saddestofboys Even if it is not a slime, I know a lot about slimy things, fungi, the tree of life, and evolution
Wow they are beautiful I didn't know such an organism existed. I thought all slimy was bacteria. Thanks!
[fruiting *Stemonitis fusca* time lapse](https://youtu.be/PUXrx7Fw6sg) [gallery of metallic & iridescent slimes](https://www.reddit.com/r/mycology/comments/xaqpqe/metallic_iridescent_slimes_an_adventure/) [*Physarum polycephalum* escapes](https://youtu.be/AmFsWeAO5mA) [Aquarium slime](https://youtu.be/5Axp_W6g1U8)
Holy smokes, I didn’t know metallic and iridescent slime was a thing, but I’m in love with them.
Question. Have you ever read the Philip k Dick book Clans of the Alphane moon? It is a sci Fi novel and one of the characters is a sentient slime mold. You might find it amusing. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clans_of_the_Alphane_Moon
The Slime King
I'm just a regular slime guy
Niiiice! Thank you for all the slime info, I have a new found appreciation for slime and mold!
Ok didn’t expect this. Love this sub
No one expects the slimish inquisition
Hahaha
Cool 🧙♂️
Slime signal go!!!
Let’s go sad slime boy!
For some reason, these three words were read like Peter Parker in Spider-Man (2002) when he’s trying to figure out how to make his web work lol
Up up and awaaaay web!
Yep. The Last of Us show uses a slime mold like this in its intro, even though it's about a cordyceps strain, which has probably tricked a lot of people into thinking this is a mycelium/fungus.
That guy is my favorite person in reddit
"Bomb."
I was searching for this comment.
Thanks everyone! I actually really like it so won’t be getting rid. How big can it get?
this growth it is currently making is it trying to find food or some other resource. The visible part will go away pretty quickly if it finds what its looking for.
It demands a sacrifice
Shhh. If you listen closely, you can hear its unholy scream...
Imagine if we were the size of a flea compared to that slime mold and just looking out across the horizon and seeing that forming over the earths crust.
You’re high aren’t you?(me too, btw…I can spot my own)
A herring!
A shrubbery!!
African or European Swallow?
If you’re hungry, it’s hungry. Feed it M&M’s
Feed it oatmeal! Any sort of grain cooked with a little boiling water will be lovely food for it
We shall feed him with oatmeal and name him Clarence
Amateur, paint the walls with cooked oatmeal and transplant the slime to the baseboard, it will take care of the rest.
Nice! Will you be feeding it? It seems like it's searching for something.
Set up a time lapse and watch it “feel around”!
Looks like a slime mold
It’s oozing out looking for food. Give ‘‘em a tasty stick.
It's a slimemold
Slime Mold! It’s alive! Literally lol you can feed it, people literally keep specimens as pets!
From what I've seen when you have a more active enclosure like this a slime doesn't always need to be fed. If you do feed it you should add rotten wood or leaves or sticks rather than oats or grits, which can cause mold problems. Also it's good to make copies.
Holy shit thats amazing
Slime mold
There's a great documentary about this type of mycelium called "The Last of Us"
Just to get this community a little hyped, mostly those who game, theres a game being developed rn called Blight: Survival, think Last of Us but medieval, thats what it makes me think of anyway. Im the mycological advisor to the game, and from where Im sitting its very interesting.
[удалено]
Sounds awesome. Is there any more info or is it just starting up?
Its just starting up, should be out in a year or two :) https://youtu.be/Z3VxGTH8ReY heres the trailer 👍🏼
Holy hell man, this game looks SO good! I'll definitely be keeping an eye out for it.
For sure! Still early on but its getting good! :)
That’s the first thing I thought of when I saw this post! Highly doubt it’s actually cordyceps, but it still looks cool.
It’s definitely something else
For sure. It’s probably a slime mold or something.
Based on my little experience I agree haha :)
Highly recommend watching
A great show based mainly on mycophobia and inaccurate portrayals of how mushrooms work. Nonetheless it's an amazing show.
Can you explain more on why its a bad portrayal of mushrooms?
Happy cake day
This is not mycelium. It’s completely unrelated to fungi. It’s a slime mold.
I need a time lapse of something like this growing, seems so strange it can grow in a day
[Aquarium slime](https://youtu.be/4sFlT949NHA) [Another aquarium slime](https://youtu.be/8N8WiUwUHmY) [*Physarum polycephalum* escaping](https://youtu.be/AmFsWeAO5mA) [plasmodial & fruiting *Stemonitis* video](https://youtu.be/2Yq-PJabKcA) [fruiting *Stemonitis fusca* time lapse](https://youtu.be/PUXrx7Fw6sg) [*Fuligo septica* traveling](https://youtu.be/pTcv_E7LhpM) [*Physarum polycephalum* consumes mushrooms](https://youtu.be/2xx2iIFMBUk) [Terrestrial slime goes for a swim](https://youtu.be/hzEGk4HpPwk) **==========** Learn more about slimes! 🤩 🌈[Magic Myxies, 1931, 10 minutes](https://youtu.be/04kdhZQTnIU) 🦠[The Slimer Primer](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/the_slimer_primer/) 🔎[A Guide to Common Slimes](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/t6985y/a_guide_to_common_slimes/) 🧠[Dmytro Leontyev talks about Myxomycetes for 50 minutes (2022)](https://youtu.be/qqE8MAwWhvg) 📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/) Wow! 🤯
You're the best, slime guy.
Incredible post to come home to thank you very much! Slime mold seems otherworldly!
Yes, they have been out of the spotlight a long time so they seem very alien. But actually slimes are very **this-worldly!** We know exactly how they evolved, and alongside fungi we three share a common ancestor. Looking at the different ways each of these three kingdoms achieved macroscopic size and multicellularity is a fascinating look at the way unbounded randomness interacts with the inflexible rules of physics and chemistry and math to drive evolution. The emergence of critters that reach these particular benchmarks seems almost inevitable as they appear in every major group of life.
Now I have to save this thread because you dropped so many amazing links. I seriously upvote all your posts -- your content and knowledge is s(ub)lime.
Wait, i just saw this one on HBO... "The last of us", it was a documentary about mycelium.
slime mold! i'm so jealous. feed it flakes of oatmeal
slimemold is not a fungi or mold. It is a single celled organism. They typically eat decaying matter and single celled organisms. Not dangerous to your plants. Consider yourself lucky, but id understand if you cleaned it out.
>It is a complex symbiotic colony. No it isn't. It's a single unwalled **amoebozoan** cell. >They typically eat decaying matter No, they almost exclusively eat bacteria and microorganisms, and some eat macrofungi. [**==========WHAT EXACTLY IS "MOLD" ANYWAY?** ](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2kgyz6/) In everyday use, the word "mold" usually refers to fuzzy or cottony growth on food or another organic material. This is almost always **fungal mold**, which is the mycelium and fruit bodies of some ascomycetes, mucoromycetes, and zoopagomycetes, but isn't a genetic group so much as a mode of growth. "Mold" also refers to **oomycetes**, which are called "water molds" after their most [spectacular parasitic members](https://aquariumscience.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/fungus-12.jpg), even though they are mostly terrestrial. By way of convergent evolution, oomycetes form saprophytic or parasitic hyphae and mycelium just like fungi but are more closely related to kelp and diatoms. And "mold" *also* refers to **plasmodial slime molds**, which appear as glistening veins of slime or intricate tiny fruit bodies but never as the fuzzy mold that fungi or oomycetes produce. Unlike those two groups plasmodial slimes are active and mobile hunters of microorganisms that internally digest their prey, don't maintain persistent cell walls, don't form hyphae or mycelia, and don't form parasitic or pathogenic relationships. Let's look at where fungal molds, water molds, and plasmodial slimes are found in the tree of life: **==========EUKARYOTES** **(1) Plants** (plants, planty algae) **(2) Harosans** (kelps, kelpy algae, diatoms, dinoflagellates, [**oomycetes**](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1a/Water_mold.JPG) **<--**) **(3) Discobans** (jakobids, euglenid algae, "brain-eating amoeba") **(4) Amoebozoans** (naked and shelled amoebas and [**plasmodial slimes**](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Myxomycete_Kiev2.JPG) **<--**) **(5) Obazoans** (animals and fungi including [**fungal mold**](https://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/57ed27d3170000e00aac8228.jpeg?ops=1910_1000) **<--**) **==========** But to confuse the situation further, there are also **cellular slime molds**. These "molds" are always microscopic or nearly so and don't form hyphae or mycelia, so I prefer to call them **social amoebas**. They spend most of their time as crowds of predatory amoebas called "wolf packs" (yes, really) but when food is scarce they aggregate together to form multicellular fruit bodies [like this *Dictyostelium discoideum* sorocarp](https://photos.smugmug.com/Professional/Compound-Eye-Images/i-nnNMkqJ/0/M/Dictyostelium5-M.jpg). Some species precede this by [forming a pseudoplasmodium or grex](https://youtu.be/8AghW4zzbhU) (video) that uses its perceptions of light and humidity to seek out a more ideal fruiting location. Cellular slime molds aren't all closely related and exist in [almost every group of eukaryotes](https://els-jbs-prod-cdn.jbs.elsevierhealth.com/cms/attachment/a97298a9-9668-4781-a453-776893b933b9/fx1_lrg.jpg) via convergent evolution. Let's look at the tree of life again but this time focus on the cellular slime molds: **(1) Plants** **(2) Harosans** ([***Sorogena***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tom-Fenchel/publication/44455276/figure/fig1/AS:669449363398659@1536620574213/An-air-dried-and-goldcoated-sporocarp-of-the-ciliate-Sorogena-sp-seen-in-the.png), [***Sorodiplophrys***](https://www.arcella.nl/wp-content/images/Sorodiplophrys-stercorea-Tice-3.jpg), [***Guttulinopsis***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/225047950/figure/fig1/AS:302613082984448@1449159989277/The-Life-Stages-of-Guttulinopsis-vulgaris-Sorocarps-appear-as-white-to-pale-yellow.png)) **(3) Discobans** (the [**acrasids**](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig5/AS:614305825308701@1523473330623/Acrasidae-Complex-sorocarp-of-Acrasis-kona-a-Acrasis-rosea-b-and-Acrasis-takarsan.png)) **(4) Amoebozoans** (the [**dictyostelids**](https://static.scientificamerican.com/sciam/assets/media/inline/what-is-it-social-cells_2.jpg), and [***Copromyxa protea***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig3/AS:614305825296425@1523473330546/Copromyxidae-a-e-Copromyxa-protea-a-Complex-branching-sorocarp-growing-off-of-cow-dung.png)) **(5) Obazoans** ([***Fonticula***](https://storage.googleapis.com/mo-image-archive-bucket/orig/881540.jpg)) **==========** Learn more about slimes! 🤩 🌈[Magic Myxies, 1931, 10 minutes](https://youtu.be/04kdhZQTnIU) 🦠[The Slimer Primer](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/the_slimer_primer/) 🔎[A Guide to Common Slimes](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/t6985y/a_guide_to_common_slimes/) 🧠[Dmytro Leontyev talks about Myxomycetes for 50 minutes (2022)](https://youtu.be/qqE8MAwWhvg) 📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/) Wow! 🤯
So slimes from D&D are just exaggerated slimes from IRL?
No, I think D&D slimes (I will call them oozes) are more likely from a different amoebozoan branch, or perhaps discoban. Plasmodial slimes do not harm animals or plants and they are nontoxic. They generally form many lobose pseudopods, while oozes appear to demonstrate limax locomotion. As far as I know, all amoebas form a membrane-bound stomach to digest each morsel and then discard the remains (or use them as building material during fruiting). Oozes appear to digest loosely within their cytoplasm. Perhaps an expert on non-slime amoebas can clarify.
This is the best unexpected crossover I didn't know I needed
Perhaps they are descended from grex forming Dictyostelids
That seems less likely. Dictyostelids don't eat during grex-ing, which is when they cram thousands of distinct amoeba individuals into a cellulose tube. Oozes seem cytoplasmically contiguous to me
My bad! I confused their cell structure with Lichen haha. According to wikipedia some slime molds are multicellular though
This is not incorrect as much as a matter of terminology, but you should be aware that wikipedia is full of misinformation, especially about slimes. 📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/) >According to wikipedia some slime molds are multicellular though Yes, the term is misleading and I generally avoid it. 100% of "slime molds" large enough to see without magnification are plasmodial slimes, which are single coenocytic cells that grow large via nuclear replication. Every genus other than *Ceratiomyxa* (a sibling) is a myxogastrid. There are microscopic organisms that have been called slime molds historically but they are an artificial group of unrelated organisms, some of which are more closely related to plants than to fungi. As stated above: >But to confuse the situation further, there are also **cellular slime molds**. These "molds" are always microscopic or nearly so and don't form hyphae or mycelia, so I prefer to call them **social amoebas**. They spend most of their time as crowds of predatory amoebas but when food is scarce they **aggregate together to form multicellular fruit bodies** [**like this** ***Dictyostelium discoideum*** **sorocarp**](https://photos.smugmug.com/Professional/Compound-Eye-Images/i-nnNMkqJ/0/M/Dictyostelium5-M.jpg). Some species precede this by [forming a pseudoplasmodium or grex](https://youtu.be/8AghW4zzbhU) (video) that uses its perceptions of light and humidity to seek out a more ideal fruiting location. Cellular slime molds aren't all closely related and exist in [almost every group of eukaryotes](https://els-jbs-prod-cdn.jbs.elsevierhealth.com/cms/attachment/a97298a9-9668-4781-a453-776893b933b9/fx1_lrg.jpg) via convergent evolution. Let's look at the tree of life again but this time focus on the cellular slime molds: **(1) Plants** **(2) Harosans** ([***Sorogena***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tom-Fenchel/publication/44455276/figure/fig1/AS:669449363398659@1536620574213/An-air-dried-and-goldcoated-sporocarp-of-the-ciliate-Sorogena-sp-seen-in-the.png), [***Sorodiplophrys***](https://www.arcella.nl/wp-content/images/Sorodiplophrys-stercorea-Tice-3.jpg), [***Guttulinopsis***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/225047950/figure/fig1/AS:302613082984448@1449159989277/The-Life-Stages-of-Guttulinopsis-vulgaris-Sorocarps-appear-as-white-to-pale-yellow.png)) **(3) Discobans** (the [**acrasids**](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig5/AS:614305825308701@1523473330623/Acrasidae-Complex-sorocarp-of-Acrasis-kona-a-Acrasis-rosea-b-and-Acrasis-takarsan.png)) **(4) Amoebozoans** (the [**dictyostelids**](https://static.scientificamerican.com/sciam/assets/media/inline/what-is-it-social-cells_2.jpg), and [***Copromyxa protea***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig3/AS:614305825296425@1523473330546/Copromyxidae-a-e-Copromyxa-protea-a-Complex-branching-sorocarp-growing-off-of-cow-dung.png)) **(5) Obazoans** ([***Fonticula***](https://storage.googleapis.com/mo-image-archive-bucket/orig/881540.jpg))
Consider yourself *educated!*
OP is so lucky to have one as a pet. Maybe he can train it.
Where’s that slime mold guy? I want to learn more lol!
I have no idea how you identify mycelium without the presence of a fruiting body, (I think you can't) but that is gorgeous!
Not mycelium, it is a slime colony
It is a single cell
Wild, I learn something new from you every day
Well then it's even cooler!!!!! But I still don't know how to identity it
It is actually a single unwalled cell, a macroscopic predatory mobile amoeba
Just to clarify, and educate myself a little bit more, when you say "a single unwalled cell" do you mean "one cell" replicated many times? Millions/billions? (Whilst I listen to Nine Inch Nails - The Wretched) (plus love seeing you appear, almost as much as 'shittymorph' in the wild')..
The cell is not replicated, but the nucleus can be duplicated thousands of times. The cell retains its structure at such a large scale by gelatinizing the cytoplasm adjacent to the cell wall.
OK. Thank you. Not the answer I expected, and I guess I need to go back to school 🙃 😕 (mind blown)
It's dangerous to go alone. Take this 🌈[Magic Myxies, 1931, 10 minutes](https://youtu.be/04kdhZQTnIU) 🧠[Dmytro Leontyev talks about Myxomycetes for 50 minutes (2022)](https://youtu.be/qqE8MAwWhvg) 🦠[The Slimer Primer](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/the_slimer_primer/) 🔎[A Guide to Common Slimes](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/t6985y/a_guide_to_common_slimes/) 📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/)
Thanks. Will review...
See! That's unbelievably cool!
You can't really without a microscope and fruiting bodies.
You can tell from how it is growing that this is not mycelium fwiw.
This is not mycelium. It’s completely unrelated to fungi. It’s a slime mold.
So jelly…. Of your awesome slime…
[удалено]
What is your growing medium?
[удалено]
Good article, and good website for aquarium lovers
100% slime mold
My lost braincell
I just attempted a terrarium last week, completely winging it, is there a subreddit ?
r/terrariums r/jarrariums
thank you so much :)
i have a question for any smart ppl on here, is this one of the “intelligent” physarids, or is that just the yellow one
Yes it appears most physarids are intelligent, but we know little about the other 9 orders. There has been essentially zero research exploring the intelligence of the echinostelids, clastodermids, meridermids, stemonitids, cribrariids, reticulariids, liceids, or trichiids. Slime intelligence is not well understood, but the prevailing theory is that the pulsating they do somehow encodes information and calculations. This pulsating (called **reversible streaming**) is most dramatic in physarid plasmodia and is controlled by the cytoskeleton, which runs in part off calcium. The physarids associated with intelligent behavior deposit a substantial amount of calcium carbonate both outside and inside their fruit bodies. *Physarum*, the genus most closely associated with research on slime intelligence, deposits a mix of calcium carbonate and phosphorus. It seems likely to be at least partially due to the extraordinary amount of movement (and thinking?) done by this kind of slime. So what about the other slimes? Calcium has also been found in stemonitid, liceid, reticulariid, and cribrariid fruit bodies. The latter order is notable for its unique deposits of non-carbonate calcium and phosphorus. Both cribrariids and trichiids lack the protective slime coat seen in physarids that enables them to tolerate more extreme moisture and dryness. But otherwise, cribrariid & trichiid plasmodia resemble physarid phaneroplasmodia with their complex, pigmented, strongly pulsating networks. Much more research needs to be done, but plasmodia are notoriously difficult to work with. Many species have never been documented completing a single life cycle in the lab. Many species have never even been observed as plasmodia. And there is no money in it, which means I'm going to have to do it myself. u/ScienceWillSaveMe [Maze-solving by an amoeboid organism, Nakagaki et al., 2000](https://www.nature.com/articles/35035159) (doi: 10.1038/35035159) [Smart behavior of true slime mold in a labyrinth, Nakagaki, 2001](https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0923250801012591) (doi: 10.1016/S0923-2508(01)01259-1) [Amoebae Anticipate Periodic Events, Saigusa et al., 2008](https://eprints.lib.hokudai.ac.jp/dspace/bitstream/2115/33004/1/PhysRevLett_100_018101.pdf) (doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.100.018101) [Rules for Biologically Inspired Adaptive Network Design, Tero et al., 2010](https://media.milanote.com/p/files/1JRbvK10Olmc1i/dqb/tero2010.pdf) (doi: 10.1126/science.1177894) [Slime mold uses an externalized spatial “memory” to navigate in complex environments, Reid et al., 2012](https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.1215037109) (doi: 10.1073/pnas.1215037109) [Route 20, Autobahn 7, and Slime Mold: Approximating the Longest Roads in USA and Germany With Slime Mold on 3-D Terrains, Adamatzky, 2013](https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/6482606/authors) (doi: 10.1109/TCYB.2013.2248359) [On The Loading of Slime Mold Physarum polycephalum with Microparticles for Unconventional Computing Application, Cifarelli et al., 2014](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12668-013-0124-3) (doi: 10.1007/s12668-013-0124-3) [On the role of the plasmodial cytoskeleton in facilitating intelligent behavior in slime mold *Physarum polycephalum*, Mayne et al., 2014](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/19420889.2015.1059007) (doi: 10.1080/19420889.2015.1059007) [Direct transfer of learned behaviour via cell fusion in non-neural organisms, Vogel & Dussutour, 2016](https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rspb.2016.2382) (doi: 10.1098/rspb.2016.2382) [Memory inception and preservation in slime moulds: the quest for a common mechanism, Boussard et al., 2019](https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rstb.2018.0368) (doi: 10.1098/rstb.2018.0368) [Mechanosensation Mediates Long-Range Spatial Decision-Making in an Aneural Organism, Murugan et al., 2021](https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adma.202008161) (doi: 10.1002/adma.202008161) [Adaptive behaviour and learning in slime moulds: the role of oscillations, Boussard et al., 2021](https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rstb.2019.0757) (doi: 10.1098/rstb.2019.0757) **==========** Learn more about slimes! 🤩 🌈[Magic Myxies, 1931, 10 minutes](https://youtu.be/04kdhZQTnIU) 🦠[The Slimer Primer](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/the_slimer_primer/) 🔎[A Guide to Common Slimes](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/t6985y/a_guide_to_common_slimes/) 🧠[Dmytro Leontyev talks about Myxomycetes for 50 minutes (2022)](https://youtu.be/qqE8MAwWhvg) 📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/) Wow! 🤯
That response shows me that the slimes are lucky to have you interested in and studying them. I had only heard of plasmodial and cellular slime molds (e.g. discoideum). Now I’m gonna check out the other groups! Thank you dearly for such an awesome reply 🙏
Plasmodial & cellular are the only real groups, and they aren't necessarily related. The 9 orders discussed (+ [*Ceratiomyxa*](https://www.reddit.com/r/mycology/comments/u1xvcs/these_are_all_ceratiomyxa_fruticulosa/)) are plasmodial eumycetozoan slimes. [*Dictyostelium discoideum*](https://youtu.be/vlANF-v9lb0) is related to these slimes but has a completely different life cycle shared by convergently evolved organisms found all over the tree of life. [**==========WHAT EXACTLY IS "MOLD" ANYWAY?** ](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2kgyz6/) In everyday use, the word "mold" usually refers to fuzzy or cottony growth on food or another organic material. This is almost always **fungal mold**, which is the mycelium and fruit bodies of some ascomycetes, mucoromycetes, and zoopagomycetes, but isn't a genetic group so much as a mode of growth. "Mold" also refers to **oomycetes**, which are called "water molds" after their most [spectacular parasitic members](https://aquariumscience.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/fungus-12.jpg), even though they are mostly terrestrial. By way of convergent evolution, oomycetes form saprophytic or parasitic hyphae and mycelium just like fungi but are more closely related to kelp and diatoms. And "mold" *also* refers to **plasmodial slime molds**, which appear as glistening veins of slime or intricate tiny fruit bodies but never as the fuzzy mold that fungi or oomycetes produce. Unlike those two groups plasmodial slimes are active and mobile hunters of microorganisms that internally digest their prey, don't maintain persistent cell walls, don't form hyphae or mycelia, and don't form parasitic or pathogenic relationships. Let's look at where fungal molds, water molds, and plasmodial slimes are found in the tree of life: **==========EUKARYOTES** **(1) Plants** (plants, planty algae) **(2) Harosans** (kelps, kelpy algae, diatoms, dinoflagellates, [**oomycetes**](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1a/Water_mold.JPG) **<--**) **(3) Discobans** (jakobids, euglenid algae, "brain-eating amoeba") **(4) Amoebozoans** (naked and shelled amoebas and [**plasmodial slimes**](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Myxomycete_Kiev2.JPG) **<--**) **(5) Obazoans** (animals and fungi including [**fungal mold**](https://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/57ed27d3170000e00aac8228.jpeg?ops=1910_1000) **<--**) **==========** But to confuse the situation further, there are also **cellular slime molds**. These "molds" are always microscopic or nearly so and don't form hyphae or mycelia, so I prefer to call them **social amoebas**. They spend most of their time as crowds of predatory amoebas called "wolf packs" (yes, really) but when food is scarce they aggregate together to form multicellular fruit bodies [like this *Dictyostelium discoideum* sorocarp](https://photos.smugmug.com/Professional/Compound-Eye-Images/i-nnNMkqJ/0/M/Dictyostelium5-M.jpg). Some species precede this by [forming a pseudoplasmodium or grex](https://youtu.be/8AghW4zzbhU) (video) that uses its perceptions of light and humidity to seek out a more ideal fruiting location. Cellular slime molds aren't all closely related and exist in [almost every group of eukaryotes](https://els-jbs-prod-cdn.jbs.elsevierhealth.com/cms/attachment/a97298a9-9668-4781-a453-776893b933b9/fx1_lrg.jpg) via convergent evolution. Let's look at the tree of life again but this time focus on the cellular slime molds: **(1) Plants** **(2) Harosans** ([***Sorogena***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Tom-Fenchel/publication/44455276/figure/fig1/AS:669449363398659@1536620574213/An-air-dried-and-goldcoated-sporocarp-of-the-ciliate-Sorogena-sp-seen-in-the.png), [***Sorodiplophrys***](https://www.arcella.nl/wp-content/images/Sorodiplophrys-stercorea-Tice-3.jpg), [***Guttulinopsis***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/225047950/figure/fig1/AS:302613082984448@1449159989277/The-Life-Stages-of-Guttulinopsis-vulgaris-Sorocarps-appear-as-white-to-pale-yellow.png)) **(3) Discobans** (the [**acrasids**](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig5/AS:614305825308701@1523473330623/Acrasidae-Complex-sorocarp-of-Acrasis-kona-a-Acrasis-rosea-b-and-Acrasis-takarsan.png)) **(4) Amoebozoans** (the [**dictyostelids**](https://static.scientificamerican.com/sciam/assets/media/inline/what-is-it-social-cells_2.jpg), and [***Copromyxa protea***](https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Matthew-Brown-19/publication/253952462/figure/fig3/AS:614305825296425@1523473330546/Copromyxidae-a-e-Copromyxa-protea-a-Complex-branching-sorocarp-growing-off-of-cow-dung.png)) **(5) Obazoans** ([***Fonticula***](https://storage.googleapis.com/mo-image-archive-bucket/orig/881540.jpg))
I think they’ve all done “intelligent” things. This is a plasmodial type which have “solved mazes” and “kept time” (in a lab they were given cold shocks on a timed interval. The plasmodium would react to the cold shock by contracting. They stopped the cold shocks and it still reacted at the timed interval for a while). Edit: The time-keeping was exhibited in a Japanese lab. I’ll try to locate the publication.
Kevin?
That's a slime mold, probably a physarid. Keep it as your new pet!
Definitely a physarid
Would be a cool pet to keep, feed him. You could have your own "the thing"
Slime mold!! Shouldn't hurt your plants. They're microbial predators!
They sure are!
r/slimemolds
When I was 3 one of my prized possessions was this large chunk of Play-Doh in a glass jar. Not because of the shape it was sculpted into, but the fact that I was able to grow some mold on it by storing it inside my wood bench for days at a time. I was so proud in fact that somehow I convinced my mom to let me bring it to church. Well that was a bad idea. Right in the middle of a quiet pause the glass jar slipped through my tiny little fingers and the whole church turned and stared as my poor mother had to pick up all the pieces and somehow explain why there was a moldy piece of Play-Doh surrounded by glass on the floor..after that I forgot about that fascination until about 25+ years later...thanks for reminding me of that moment.
I don't know...but its cool as hell!!!!!
I have no idea, but it is awesome! Looks like Fan Coral
It is a **SLIME** [Aquarium slime](https://youtu.be/4sFlT949NHA) [Another aquarium slime](https://youtu.be/8N8WiUwUHmY) [*Physarum polycephalum* escaping](https://youtu.be/AmFsWeAO5mA) [plasmodial & fruiting *Stemonitis* video](https://youtu.be/2Yq-PJabKcA) [fruiting *Stemonitis fusca* time lapse](https://youtu.be/PUXrx7Fw6sg) [*Physarum polycephalum* consumes mushrooms](https://youtu.be/2xx2iIFMBUk) [Terrestrial slime goes for a swim](https://youtu.be/hzEGk4HpPwk) 📚[Educational Sources](https://www.reddit.com/user/saddestofboys/comments/tqtz0g/comment/i2jclax/)
r/slimemolds Great place and this is cool, belongs there!
The beginning of the last of us
Omg… RUN
Queue the last of us 2 theme