Network Seminar Series | Visiting Speaker, Spring Term
‘Predatory Fungal–Nematode Interactions Across Scales’
The Network welcomed Yen-Ping Hsueh (Max Planck Institute for Biology Tübingen) as Keynote Speaker on Thursday 26 March at the Flowers Building, South Kensington Campus.
Yen-Ping presented (together with superb visuals) Predatory Fungal–Nematode Interactions Across Scales. Imagine a microscopic world where fungi set traps, lure prey with chemical bait, and even poison worms through their nerve endings. It sounds like science fiction, but it’s happening in soil, everywhere in the world. Yen-Ping Hsueh presented how her lab is unravelling the predatory playbook of carnivorous fungi using two fascinating model systems. The first, Arthrobotrys oligospora, is a nematode-trapping fungus that eavesdrops on its prey’s chemical signals to spring sticky, lasso-like traps. This fungus deploys a specialised arsenal of proteins for efficient capture, and even producing a chemical compound called (MMB) that lures the model nematode C. elegans to its doom. The second, the oyster mushroom Pleurotus ostreatus, takes an even more sinister approach: it attacks from the nematode’s sensory cilia and triggers rapid neuronal cell death. This strategy is aided by tiny lollipop-shaped structures on the hyphae called toxocysts, which are loaded with the volatile compound 3-octanone. Together, these systems reveal that fungi have evolved strikingly diverse and sophisticated strategies to hunt their preys.
