Why humans hunt for mushrooms, and not the other way around?

People and mushrooms belong to the same eukaryotic taxon called Opisthokonta. While they exhibit some similarities on the cellular level, they are very different multicellular organisms, as seen every spring when people hunt mushrooms and not the other way around. While both are characterized as complex multicellular organisms, animals are clearly more complex. Review by Hassan Hashimi and his colleagues in Biological Reviews deals with the dynamin-related proteins that shape mitochondria in fungi and animals, named respectively Mgm1 and Opa1. These have been considered to be true homologs (i.e. derived from the same protein before opisthokonts split into animals and fungi). Their work in the past has shown that this is not the case, and these proteins impact their mitochondria in very different ways despite their ostensible similarities. This review systematically dissects these differences and how they may underlie phenotypes we observe today. They propose the action of Opa1 in remodeling mitochondrial membranes likely represents a pre-adaptation for apoptosis, a developmental process that involves transformation of mitochondria. This in turn helped the emergence of motile mushroom hunters and their stationary prey.

Article available here: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/brv.13168 

Contact: doc. Mgr. Hassan Hashimi, Ph.D. (hashim00@prf.jcu.cz)