It is remarkable that a highly prized, edible species such as Caesar's mushroom (Amanita caesarea (Scop.: Fr.) Pers.) should belong to the same group as the most toxic mushrooms such as the Death cap (A. phalloides (Fr.) Link), the Destroying angel (A. virosa (Fr.) Bertillon) and the Fly agaric (A. muscaria (L.) Fr.). It is a species frequently encountered in Italian restaurants, and in the market places of Italy, Spain and southern France. Clearly, the greatest care must be taken to avoid confusion with other Amanita species if it collected in the wild. It occurs in warm, dry, Mediterranean localities, typically under oak or sweet chestnut from late summer onwards, and can be found in great abundance. The restricted distribution may extend slightly into eastern Europe but not northwards.

Names of fungi

1. Sclerotinia curreyana (Berkeley ex Currey) P. Karsten = Myriosclerotinia curreyana (Berkeley ex Currey) Buchwald; conidial state Myrioconium Sydow

2. Sclerotinia Fuckeliana (de Bary) Fuckel = Botryotinia fuckeliana (de Bary) Whetzel; conidial state Botrytis cinerea Persoon ex Fries

3. Sclerotinia fructigena (Persoon) Schröter = Monilia fructigena Honey ex Whetzel; conidial state Monilia fructigena (Persoon) Eaton

Introduction: Features of interest

Members of the Sclerotiniaceae are plant pathogens characterized by stalked apothecia with inoperculate asci. Apothecia arise from stromata, e.g. sclerotia which are formed on or in the tissue of the host plant. The apothecial state and the type of stroma are typical and taxonomically relevant features of the Sclerotiniaceae, and the family has been supported and delimited by DNA sequence data (Carbone & Kohn, 1993; Holst-Jensen et al., 1997a,b).

The behaviour of Suillia flies on basidiocarps of Hebeloma radicosum was studied in central Japan. Hebeloma radicosum is a peculiar fungus that fruits only on talpid mole middens, near the moles' nests. All insect species around selected basidiocarps of this mushroom species were observed, their behaviour studied, and identified in late October to early November 1992, and again briefly in 2001. During these periods, Suillia flies were seen on the basidiocarps, while other insect species were rarely observed. Usually one Suillia fly (male) occupied one basidiocarp and prevented other conspecifics from occupying the same basidiocarp. This appeared to be pre-mating territorial behaviour. Larval stages of Suillia are known to be mycophagous, and the territorial behaviour is presumably performed to defend oviposition sites. This is the first report from Asia on ecological aspects of Suillia flies.

It is well known that many fungi are host-specific, i.e. their fruiting is restricted to one host plant or a group of closely related hosts. An example is Hypoxylon fragiforme whose perithecial stromata are common on dead trunks and branches of beech, Fagus sylvatica (Fig 1), but are only occasionally found on other woody hosts. Mycelium of H. fragiforme is present mainly in the sapwood rather than the bark of branches of healthy beech trees, and this fungus has therefore been called a xylotropic endophyte (Chapela, 1989). Colonization is not extensive so long as the water content of infected host tissue remains high, but if branches are cut from living trees and allowed to dry, the mycelium extends rapidly (Chapela & Boddy, 1988a,b; Chapela, 1989).

Traditional methods alone often make it difficult to identify isolates to species level. Armillaria and Cylindrocladium are examples where new technologies could achieve this quickly and reliably. Rapid identification of pathogens is of great importance in their control, especially when dealing with quarantine organisms where detection of pathogens at early stages is critical.

Some of the participants at the 2001 world model airplane championship contest in Lost Hills, California, took home more than suntans and souvenirs. One participant from the UK and one from Finland became very ill with a flu-like pulmonary disease. They had been infected with Coccidioides immitis, a fungus endemic to the Californian deserts and a few other similar sites in the New World. Their illness, coccidioidomycosis (also known colloquially and historically as Valley Fever, San Joaquin Valley Fever and Gilchrist's Disease) is a mycosis with a rich and remarkable history.

Anyone who followed the developing epidemic of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in the media would be in little doubt as to the threat posed by new and unexpected diseases. Whilst the general public is probably more familiar with the various ′exotic′ viruses that have emerged in the past thirty years, medical mycology also has its own share of important emergent pathogens. In a regional context the most important of these is Penicillium marneffei Segratin et. al. – the causative agent of penicilliosis. This has become a very important complication in AIDS patients in large parts of the Far East, particularly in Thailand, Southern China and Hong Kong. Unlike more familiar fungal pathogens, such as Candida albicans and Aspergillus fumigatus, P. marneffei has only a short history – indeed it was first described as recently as the mid-1950s.

The host range and distribution of species of Epichloë in Britain are investigated based on herbarium material held at Kew and an assessment of the literature and other available records. Six species of the genus can now be recognised in Britain, three of which are reported for the first time, and Holcus mollis is confirmed as a host for E. clarkii. A potential seventh species, E. elymi, requires confirmation as British. Brief descriptions, with host range, and a key for the identification of these species are presented.

Mycophagy of Biscogniauxia stromata by rats and beetles on New Zealand's offshore islands is illustrated and discussed.

Sometimes progress in mycology is so significant that it contributes to understanding in the wider scientific arena. To reflect this, an ad hoc series of articles will be published in the Mycologist outlining examples of when this has occurred. This, the first of these articles, examines work by Katinka and co-workers who have published a summary of findings about the genetic code (genome sequence) of the fungal parasite Encephalitozoon cuniculi (Nature 414: 450-453; 22/11/2001). Katinka et al. found that although fungi are complex organisms, the cellular machinery required to make a fungus can be very simple.

The two previous parts to this review have emphasised the relatively small number of mould toxins, associated with the mould genera Penicillium, Aspergillus and Fusarium, which may have the greatest impact in the context of human foods. There are, however, a large number of toxic mould metabolites, produced by a diverse range of other mould genera, with an extraordinary diversity of chemical structure and biological activity. The chemical structures are fascinating and worth studying because they provide clues about biosynthetic pathways and possible biological activity. The moulds producing them occur in a wide range of ecological niches from endophytes, obligate plant pathogens to saprophytes. This diversity will be explored from two points of view – damp houses and animal pastures.

Symbiotic mycorrhizal fungi play a central role in biological interactions and biogeochemical cycles since the carbon they obtain from their photosynthetic plant hosts is allocated via the mycorrhizal mycelium to the soil ecosystem (Finlay & Rosling, 2005). The focus of much early mycorrhizal research was on the effect of the mycorrhizal mycelium on uptake of inorganic nutrients by individual plants, often studied in the absence of other soil organisms. More recent research has a broader focus on a wider range of possible effects (Newsham et al., 1995; Finlay, 2004). In addition to interactions with their own host plant roots, the mycelia interact with a range of organic and inorganic substrates, as well as with different organisms such as bacteria, fungi, soil micro- and meso-fauna and the roots of secondary host plants. Three trends in mycorrhizal research, noted by Smith and Read in 1997, are still relevant today. New information from the fossil record and, in particular, developments in molecular phylogeny have enabled progress in understanding different evolutionary aspects of the symbiosis (Hibbett et al., 2000; Corradi et al., 2004; Bidartondo, 2005). Secondly, there is an increased emphasis on the extraradical mycelium, the most dynamic component of the symbiosis, the fungal hyphae growing from the host plant roots that make direct contact with organic and inorganic substrates and interact with other soil organisms (Leake et al. 2004a).

Early in the nineteenth century John Curtis (1833) investigated flies attracted to a phalloid fructification in England. The fungus was found in some abundance on “the sand-hills near Lowestoft, Suffolk, in the middle of October”. It had a scent like violets at a distance, in the field, but was very offensive when dried. Curtis stated that it seemed “to differ materially from the Phallus foetidus Lam. (P. impudicus Linn.)”. Flies of all descriptions were much attached to the fungus and, as well as bees and beetles, seemed very fond of the “shining matter which dropped from the pileus”. The bees were not identified. A pale pinkish flush over the volva was visible in the original illustration. The fungus seems to represent Phallus hadriani Vent. (syn. P. iosmus Berk.) the basal volva of which becomes pinkish to reddish when exposed. It is also said to smell sweeter than P. impudicus, often of violets. It is the less common of the two Phallus species in Britain, being more or less restricted to coastal dunes (Pegler et al., 1995).

For almost eighty years, I have had an intermittent interest in Ganoderma adspersum and Fomes fomentarius, both of which form large woody basidiomes on the trunks of beech trees. The first encounter with Ganoderma was in Clandeboye Domain near Bangor in Northern Ireland when, after a titanic struggle, a huge specimen was detached from a beech tree and borne in triumph to the Botany Department near the start of my undergraduate life in 1922 at Queen's University, Belfast. A couple of years later I read the first two volumes of Buller's ‘Researches on Fungi’ and was excited by his perceptive analysis of Ganoderma in relation to spore liberation (Buller, 1922).

Opportunistic fungal infections have emerged in the past ten to twenty years as some of the most significant and potentially lethal infectious diseases to confront contemporary medicine. Fungi such as Candida albicans, Aspergillus fumigatus and Cryptococcus neoformans have emerged from obscurity to threaten many patient groups. Although the latter of these, the yeast C. neoformans, was identified as a potential pathogen as early as 1894, it was not until the 1950s that a systematic appreciation of its potential as an opportunistic pathogen began. During this decade the association between the heightened risk of C. neoformans infection (cryptococcosis) and various cancers of the blood became obvious. Fortunately, just as the risk posed by this yeast to human health was being clearly defined (in the late 1950s), the first effective therapy to treat cryptococcosis appeared - the drug amphotericin B. This was particularly timely since it had been recognised that C. neoformans infection often led to a rapidly fatal form of meningitis if untreated.

Throughout the 1960s the infection remained relatively rare, being largely confined to the patient group described above. However, by the late 1970s the incidence of C. neoformans infection began to rise rapidly. Cases were now being seen in patients undergoing organ transplantation, in those with autoimmune diseases and in others who were receiving immunosuppressive drugs to treat various cancers. Cryptococcosis had suddenly become 'the awakening giant' amongst fungal infections (Kaufman & Blumer,1977); but quite how much of a ‘giant’ would only become clear in the next two decades with the development of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) epidemic.

This photograph appeared in the Cambridge Evening News in September 2002 under the caption: “Giant … the garden's Jane Grimes with a Rigidoporus ulmarius nearly 5 m in circumference”. This reminded me that I had earlier been shown another very large specimen of this fungus in Kew Gardens. On contacting Alick Henrici as to this specimen in July 2003, he informed me that the Kew fungus had appeared some years ago in the Guinness Book of Records. In the 1995 edition of this work it was entered as the Largest Tree Fungus, measuring (in 1992) 150 x 144 cm with a circumference of 454 cm, and in the 1999 edition, measured in 1995, the size was recorded as 163 x 140 cm with a circumference of 480 cm. This meant that the Cambridge specimen might be of world class, so Jane, with arborist David Franklin and myself forthwith went to measure it. Our results showed it a worthy contender but less large at 150 x 133 cm diameter and 425 cm circumference.

A magnificent set of fungal stamps was issued in New Zealand as a miniature sheet (Fig 1) and as individual stamps on 6th March 2002. They illustrate, with six colourful examples, some of the diversity of the basidiomycetes. These are the first stamps about fungi to be issued in New Zealand, although a set of health stamps issued in 1977 showed drawings of children studying a bird, a frog and a butterfly with a few fruit bodies of fly agarics in the foreground. In 1988, the 40c value of a set of stamps depicting native birds shows a brown kiwi apparently looking at some small fungal fruitbodies. These stamps are illustrated and described in McKenzie (1997). Details of the species depicted in this recent set are given below.

A brief introductory exercise in the use of on-line databases to examine fungal genes and their products is described. Fungal genes make particularly good teaching models owing to their relatively simple eukaryotic structure and wide range of homologues in higher organisms including humans. An evaluation of students' reactions to the exercise is included.

Pneumocystis is an enigmatic organism, the clinical significance of which remained unrecognised until recently. It is a respiratory pathogen, causing pneumonia which, if untreated, is fatal. For many years its very nature was shrouded in uncertainty, but we now know unequivocally that it is a fungus and an important agent of fungal disease in certain specific settings. Pneumocystis was first seen in the lungs of guinea pigs by Carlos Chagas in 1909, and then in rat lungs by Antonio Carini. Both thought it was a type of trypanosome. In 1912, the Delanoë husband-and-wife team recognised that it was a distinct organism and named it Pneumocystis carinii, on account of the cyst-like morphology of the organism and in honour of Antonio Carini. It was first seen as an infection in humans in the 1920s, among infants with interstitial plasma cell pneumonia.