{"id":241,"date":"2025-09-23T14:24:16","date_gmt":"2025-09-23T13:24:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/?p=241"},"modified":"2025-09-23T14:24:17","modified_gmt":"2025-09-23T13:24:17","slug":"the-fascinating-map-of-fungi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/index.php\/2025\/09\/23\/the-fascinating-map-of-fungi\/","title":{"rendered":"The Fascinating Map of Fungi"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Fungi are one of the most diverse organisms on Earth and contribute to many aspects of life as we know it. They\u2019re the most populous kingdom on the planet \u2013 an estimated 3.8million fungi exist worldwide \u2013 and yet, more than 90% of them are currently unknown to science.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A characteristic that places fungi in a different kingdom from plants, bacteria, and some protists is chitin in their cell walls. Fungi, like animals, are heterotrophs, they acquire their food by absorbing dissolved organic molecules, typically by secreting digestive enzymes into their environment. Fungi do not photosynthesize. Growth is their means of mobility, except for spores, which may travel through the air or water. Fungi are the principal decomposers in ecological systems. The video below from &#8220;Domain of Science&#8221; goes through a lot in short time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<div class=\"ast-oembed-container \" style=\"height: 100%;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"The Fascinating Map of Fungi\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/5FqFg-rjzPo?start=408&#038;feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Fungi are one of the most diverse organisms on Earth and contribute to many aspects of life as we know it. They\u2019re the most populous kingdom on the planet \u2013 an estimated 3.8million fungi exist worldwide \u2013 and yet, more than 90% of them are currently unknown to science. A characteristic that places fungi in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-241","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=241"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":242,"href":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/241\/revisions\/242"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=241"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=241"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iworm.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=241"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}