{"id":2268,"date":"2014-07-09T17:06:29","date_gmt":"2014-07-09T22:06:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/?p=2268"},"modified":"2014-07-12T17:26:06","modified_gmt":"2014-07-12T22:26:06","slug":"a-tale-of-good-fungus-bad-fungus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/a-tale-of-good-fungus-bad-fungus\/","title":{"rendered":"A tale of good fungus, bad fungus<img src=\"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/01\/canada_flag_icon_small.gif\">"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_2227\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/MG_7150.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-2227\" class=\"size-full wp-image-2227\" src=\"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/MG_7150.jpg\" alt=\"These eastern pine trees from New Brunswick contain a beneficial fungus that produces a compound to keep other fungi away. Surprisingly, the same strain of fungus is also found in the lowbush blueberry, a plant that shares the same Acadian forest habitat. (Photo credit: J. D. Irving Ltd.)\" width=\"300\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/MG_7150.jpg 300w, http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/MG_7150-200x300.jpg 200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-2227\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">These eastern pine trees from New Brunswick contain a beneficial fungus that produces a compound to keep other fungi away. Surprisingly, the same strain of fungus is also found in the lowbush blueberry, a plant that shares the same Acadian forest habitat. (Photo credit: J. D. Irving Ltd.)<\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Researchers have found a new source for a fungus-fighting chemical: the pine trees and blueberry bushes of the Acadian forest.\u00a0<\/span>Griseofulvin is a compound originally isolated from a mould in the same family as those which produce penicillin. It\u2019s used to fight fungal infections in humans and animals, but has also been used as a fungicide against crop diseases.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Now, it\u2019s been discovered that a previously unknown beneficial fungus that lives within the needles of eastern white pine trees also produces the compound. Surprisingly, the same fungus was also found in lowbush blueberries, an unrelated plant that shares the same habitat. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The fact that beneficial fungus are shared between between pine trees and understory plants is a new finding that sheds light on our understanding of diversity in the Acadian forest.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S175450481400066X\" target=\"_blank\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Original research paper<\/span><\/a>\u00a0published in the journal\u00a0<em>Fungal Ecology<\/em><span style=\"font-style: italic; color: #000000;\">\u00a0<\/span>on\u00a0<strong>June 24, 2014<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>Names and affiliations of selected\u00a0authors<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<h4 dir=\"ltr\" style=\"color: #222222;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Professor J. David Miller, Carleton University,\u00a0<span style=\"color: #000000;\">Ontario<\/span><\/span><\/h4>\n<h4 dir=\"ltr\" style=\"color: #222222;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Susan Richardson, Carleton University,\u00a0<span style=\"color: #000000;\">Ontario<\/span><\/span><\/h4>\n<h4 dir=\"ltr\" style=\"color: #222222;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Allison Walker, Carleton University, Ontario<\/span><\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Researchers have found a new source for a fungus-fighting chemical: the pine trees and blueberry bushes of the Acadian forest.\u00a0Griseofulvin is a compound originally isolated from a mould in the same family as those which produce penicillin. It\u2019s used to fight fungal infections in humans and animals, but has also been used as a fungicide [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2227,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[113,32,215,1328,50],"class_list":["post-2268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-paper-of-interest","tag-biology","tag-chemistry","tag-environment","tag-fungus","tag-ontario"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/07\/MG_7150.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4DqbN-AA","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2268"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2317,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268\/revisions\/2317"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}