Kingdom Fungi

Description-Fungi are a kingdom of eukaroytic organisms separate from plants and animals. They have cell walls, but these contain chitin rather than cellulose. Many from symbiotic relationships with other organisms, or feed on decomposing organic matter, rather than growing in soil like plants.

Body Plan-Fungi are usually multicellular organisms, but some unicellular fungi do exist. For example, researchers are considering classifying Microsporidia, a type of unicellular parasite, as fungi. An example of a more typical, multicellular fungi would be Tuber Magnatum, a type of truffle used in cooking gourmet foods.

Divergent Event-Fungi appear to have diverged from other eukaroytic organisms (which later developed into plants and animals) about 1 billion years ago. The fungal fossil record is largely incomplete, due to the fact that fungal tissues are rarely preserved: the earliest known fungal fossils date back a mere 400 million years, and therefore exact identification of a divergent event is impossible.

Metabolism- Fungi are entirely heterotrophic, lacking chloroplasts to convert sunlight into energy, and rely on metabolizing existing organic compounds to obtain energy.

Digestion-Digestion in fungi is extracellular; it takes place through the use of enzymes, which break down the complex organic molecules that fungi consume and then deliver nutrients to the cell.

Circulation-Fungi possess a long, branching structure called the hypha, which assists in the exchange of nutrients and water between different parts of the fungus, but no traditional circulatory system.

Respiration-Fungi do not have any respiratory systems, but certain types of fungi (such as yeats) can perform cell respiration

Nervous-Fungi possess no nervous system

Reproduction-Fungi reproduce through spreading spores, a form of sexual reproduction, and certain types can also perform meiosis, a type of asexual reproduction

Examples-Baker’s yeast is a single celled fungi used to make bread and other culinary products such as alcohol.

Penicillins, which are crucial antibiotics that destroy the cell walls of bacteria, are also classified as fungi.