Why it's so hard to tell the age of a fungus

One of the world’s largest organisms is an Oregon fungus thought to be over 8,000 years old. But what does age mean to a fungus, anyway?

When you see a mushroom popping up from the forest floor, that mushroom is just the tip of the fungal iceberg for a vast world beneath the surface. But the nature of fungal life makes it hard to answer some basic questions. What exactly does it mean to be one individual organism? And how do you tell how old a fungus is, when parts of it can recycle, regenerate, and grow again?

Flora talks with fungal researcher Kristin Aleklett about the challenge of fungal age, and how researchers are trying to better understand what fungi are doing in the world under the ground.

Guest:

Dr. Kristin Aleklett is a researcher at Lund University in Sweden.

Transcript will be available after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.

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