What Everyone Should Know About Fungi by Age 15

8️⃣ Mycorrhizal fungi extend root systems up to 100 times their normal reach, enabling plants to access hard-to-reach nutrients like phosphorus and nitrogen.

See the top 10 list (www.spun.earth/articles/top...) and follow for new fungal facts.

Join us in welcoming Ida Auken and Sir Andrew Steer to SPUN’s Board of Directors. As #COP30 Brazil approaches, we are pleased to bring new expertise to our leadership team to help guide our climate and biodiversity strategies.

🇵🇪 We sampled for fungi through WATER, SOIL, and ROCK to better understand how deep soil fungi help regulate the carbon cycle with @tobykiers.bsky.social, Merlin Sheldrake, Fungi Foundation’s Giuliana Furci and collaborator Walter Huaraca 🇵🇪

Special thanks to Cosmo Sheldrake and Tomás Munita.

What Everyone Should Know About Fungi by Age 15

7️⃣ Mycorrhizal fungi help clean polluted soils by breaking down or immobilizing harmful substances. They act as filters, protecting groundwater & supporting healthier ecosystems.

See the top 10 list (buff.ly/33Ov3UD) and follow for new fungal facts.

Are the fungi in Colombia’s moorlands >3,000m different from those along lowland coasts? Underground Explorer Luis Salcedo and Thomas Reitz collected samples across ecoregions to uncover who lives belowground.

These data will help close the tropical research gap & support conservation efforts.

6️⃣ Functioning like underground pumps, mycorrhizal fungi transport water from deep in the soil to plant roots. This adaptation is key for survival in arid conditions and helps plants withstand drought and water stress.

See the top 10 list (buff.ly/33Ov3UD) and follow for new fungal facts.

Recently, we mapped endemic fungal networks in Zagori 🇬🇷 with @seanmaston.bsky.social, @vkokkoris.bsky.social and team.

Vikos Gorge is a hotspot for endangered species, with underground systems supported by rock formations ~160 million yrs old.

We're now returning to cover more ground.

What Everyone Should Know About Fungi by Age 15

5️⃣ Mycorrhizal fungi are often first responders post wildfires, droughts, and human disturbances, helping plants regenerate, rebuild root systems & reestablish nutrient pathways.

See the top 10 list (buff.ly/nMNaB60) and follow for new fungal facts.

What Everyone Should Know About Fungi by Age 15

4️⃣ Mycorrhizal fungi help draw down ~13 billion tons of carbon into the soil annually–nearly 1/3 of global emissions from fossil fuels.

See the top 10 list (buff.ly/56WQ1oO) and follow for new fungal facts.

Led by SPUN's @adricorrales.bsky.social, we visited Huila, Colombia with -196°C liquid nitrogen to collect fungal RNA.

RNA offers a look into the function of fungal genes, but it degrades quickly, so all samples had to be frozen immediately.

Full field update from Colombia coming soon.

What Everyone Should Know About Fungi by Age 15

3️⃣ Mycorrhizal fungi underpin food production. Most crops we rely on depend on mycorrhizal fungi for nutrient absorption, access to water and protection from heavy metals.

See the top 10 list (buff.ly/56WQ1oO) and follow for new fungal facts.

What Everyone Should Know About Fungi by Age 15

2️⃣ > 400 million years ago, mycorrhizal fungi enabled plants to transition from aquatic to terrestrial environments, making life on land possible.

See the top 10 list (buff.ly/77S4PQF ) and follow for new fungal facts.

Ever sampled frozen soil before? 🧊

SPUN's Michael Van Nuland and Jinsu Elhance, with local collaborator @mmuscarella.bsky.social explored the coastal tundra plain before traveling to higher elevations in the Arctic foothill tundra finding new flowers, fungi & wildlife with the changing terrain.

What Everyone Should Know About Fungi by Age 15

1️⃣ Just one teaspoon of healthy soil can contain 100 meters of fungal hyphae.

See the top 10 list (buff.ly/77S4PQF) and follow for new fungal facts.

Permafrost has long been a carbon sink, but what happens when the Arctic tundra thaws?

SPUN's Jinsu Elhance and Michael Van Nuland traveled to Alaska, joining collaborator Mario Muscarella, to determine who is living belowground and how they can provide resilience in these ecosystems.

Our maps predicted the steppes of Kazakhstan as hotspots of fungal biodiversity. No samples had been collected to identify which mycorrhizal fungi exist there.

@bethanfmanley.bsky.social and @thecrobe.bsky.social went to ground truth the prediction and New Humanist wrote about it: buff.ly/oIg3dDo

Can plant biodiversity predict underground fungal diversity?

New study published in Nature Communications finds only 8.8% of arbuscular mycorrhizal and 1.5% of ectomycorrhizal fungal diversity hotspots overlap with plant hotspots.

Link to paper: www.nature.com/articles/s41... 🧵