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Scientists have made a great discovery in Canada, but it is so small that you need a microscope to see it.
Scientists have reported discovering what they thought were the remains of the oldest known mushroomwhich could be one billion years old. They found it in the Arctic region of Canada and named it Ourasphaira giraldae.
A report on their discovery was published in the journal Nature.
The multicellular mushroom is an ancestor of a large group of organisms, which today includes fungi, yeasts and molds. Ourasphaira lived where a river flows into a sea, about 900 to 1 billion years ago. It's twice as old as the mushrooms found before.
Until now, the oldest known fossil fungus, discovered in Scotland, was about 410 million years old.
But some researchers are not yet sure that the fossil is really a mushroom. Mary Berbee, a scientist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, said Nature that there is "a reason to believe that it is real at this stage". She added that "more The data would be really helpful. "
Although you may not be happy to see mold growing in your home or on your food, mushrooms do have a lot of work to do. They help organic matter to decompose or decompose.
What are mushrooms?
Mushrooms, plural mushrooms, are part of a large group of organisms called eukaryotes. The group includes both animals and plants, which have a clearly defined nucleus in their cells.
An important difference between mushrooms and plants is that mushrooms can not feed themselves using sunlight. This process is called photosynthesis.
Mushrooms and animals have developed together in a close relationship on Earth. The researchers believe that, as a result, microscopic animals may have lived at the same time as the Ourasphaira fungus. But until now, the earliest animal fossils date back to about 635 million years ago.
Corentin Loron is a paleobiologist at the University of Liège in Belgium and senior editor of the report. He said that even though mushrooms are one of the most diverse Eukaryotic groups today, their ancient fossil record is "very rare". In other words, they are not numerous.
The most recent fossils have been found in rocks in the Northwest Territories of Canada. Scientific tests have dated them from the Proterozoic era. It was a time before the appearance of complex life forms on Earth. Loren said the fossil record of this period "is still mysterious puzzleand we just added a new piece. "
The researchers decided that it was a fossil fungus because they identified the presence of a substance called chitin in the cell walls of Ourasphaira. Chitin is also found in creatures without a spine, such as insects and the crustaceans.
Loron said that speaking of mushrooms, "we think of poisonous fungi or mold that thrive on food". down their food.
I am Anne Ball.
Will Dunham reported this story for Reuters. Anne Ball adapted it to learn English. George Grow was the publisher.
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Words in this story
mushroom – not. a group of spore-producing organisms that feed on organic matter
The data – not. facts and other information used to reason or make estimates
mold – not. a soft substance that develops on the surface of wet or decaying things
fossil – not. remains of a plant or an animal having lived in ancient times
plural – adj. suggesting more than one
diverse – adj. different one from the other
puzzle – not. a puzzle made up of many pieces cut into different shapes that can be assembled to form an image
crustacean – not. a kind of animal (like a crab or a lobster) that has several pairs of legs and a body made up of parts covered with a hard outer shell
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