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Mycellium

Many microbes (e.g. fungi) produce mycellium. Mycellium is a collection of hyphae which looks like threadlike tissue (see microscopic picture to right) that require a microscope to be seen. To the right is some hypha with two circular sporangia (reproductive structures) from a Pythium (a fungus like organism) growing in agar. Pythium can cause soil-borne disease of plants (e.g. damping-off) and spreads vegatively through the soil via mycellium. When grown on nutrient rich agar mycellium can be seen unaided (see below). If you want to see roots of a plant being infected by Pythium then click the link.

Below (left) is a photograph of a Petri plate containing agar media growing an isolate of Fusarium (a plant soil-borne pathogen). Although a single hypha is too small to be seen unaided, the mycellium is dense enough that it is visible without the aid of a microscope. The time-lapse (below right) is specially lit and shows the growth of Mortierella mycellium that radiates out from a divot of agar transferred to a fresh plate with agar (like jello). The hyphae of Mortierella are clear and difficult to see without special lighting. Mortierella is a common fungus found in soil. Unlike Fusarium, Mortierella is a saprobe meaning it consumes dead material and functions as a decomposer and does not cause disease.

Note: the larger black circle in the time-lapse is actually a paper disk from a whole puncher which is used to block the light source used to illuminate the subject. The agar divot is just to the right of it.

This sequence was shot over nearly 4 days at a frame rate of one every 20 minutes using Canon Digital Rebel tethered to a laptop running the program RemoteCapture 2.7.