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FINE STRUCTURE OF FUNGI AS REVEALED BY ELECTRON MICROSCOPY
Author(s) -
HAWKER LILIAN E.
Publication year - 1965
Publication title -
biological reviews
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 4.993
H-Index - 165
eISSN - 1469-185X
pISSN - 1464-7931
DOI - 10.1111/j.1469-185x.1965.tb00795.x
Subject(s) - biology , cell wall , vacuole , budding , spore , electron microscope , ultrastructure , botany , sporogenesis , mycelium , microbiology and biotechnology , cytoplasm , biophysics , physics , optics
Summary 1. The cells of yeasts and filamentous fungi are surrounded by a cell wall. The cytoplast is bounded by a plasmalemma and contains nuclei, mitochondria, food granules and vacuoles. 2. Cell walls of vegetative fungal cells usually possess a microfibrillar ‘skeleton’, architecturally similar to that of plants, but composed of chitin or hemicellulose. True cellulose predominates only in the Oomycetes. Spore walls are often differently constructed from those of vegetative cells of the same species. 3. The cell contents (plasmalemma, endoplasm and endoplasmic reticulum, nucleus, mitochondria, vacuoles and miscellaneous granular inclusions), as seen in sections and in centrifuged material, are in general similar to those of plants. Some minor differences are indicated. The structure of the flagella of motile cells of the Lower Fungi is fundamentally similar to that of the flagella of lower plants and animals. 4. The electron microscope has contributed to our knowledge of growth and development of fungal structures. It has extended previous knowledge of the process of budding in yeasts, of the development of haustoria and of the formation and germination of fungal spores. 5. Poor nutrition, anaerobic conditions and sublethal irradiation cause abnormalities in the structure of mitochondria. Toxic amounts of irradiation prevent normal nuclear division in budding yeast cells. 6. Electron microscope studies have aided taxonomy by demonstrating fundamental structural differences between Fungi and Actinomycetes and between certain subdivisions of the fungi.