El extraño fenómeno de los hongos que brillan en Japón
Durante la temporada de lluvias en ciertas regiones de Japón, los bosques comienzan a poblarse de pequeñas luces: en los troncos de los árboles y en el suelo húmedo crecen cientos de hongos bioluminiscentes, que gracias a una reacción quÃmica producida por una enzima, emiten una luz que resplandece en un tono verdoso.
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La razón del fenómeno de los hongos bioluminiscentes aún no ha sido explicada cientÃficamente, aunque según la teorÃa, se cree que es una respuesta a la necesidad de supervivencia: al brillar, atraen insectos que ayudan a dispersar esporas en un ambiente donde la dispersión por viento está muy limitada.
Los hongos luminiscentes, crecen sólo en los bosques nativos con muchos árboles, donde los seres humanos han interferido muy poco, por lo que su descubrimiento es relativamente, bastante reciente.
El fenómeno de hongos luminiscentes se produce entre finales de mayo a julio en los bosques de la isla Mesameyama en Ugui, en la Prefectura de Wakayama, aunque también se han encontrado ejemplares en zonas costeras del sur de la penÃnsula de Kii, en Kyushu y otras regiones. Miles de visitantes realizan visitas nocturnas guiadas por los bosques de Masameyama para deslumbrarse con el espectáculo.
Sólo en Japón, existen 10 variedades de hongos luminiscentes. Aunque pequeños, los hongos viven unos pocos dÃas y pueden conformar una verdadera “constelación” que parece imitar en una escala minúscula el cielo estrellado. La especie de las imágenes se conoce como Mycena lux-coeli, algo asà como “hongos de luz celestial”.
Existen otras variedades de hongos bioluminiscentes que crecen en los bosques al sur de Brasil (Jack-o-Lantern Mushroom), capaces de emitir luz durante todo el dÃa.
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WOW! I have lived in Japan for over 15 years but never saw these before. DOUMO ARIGATOU! :O)
Can you eat them?!
Wow, it’s Fallout 3 coming to life. Now I fear Super Mutants are coming to get me.
awesome!
has anyone tried eating these yet!!!!!!!!!!!!
we could turn neon!!!!!!!!!!
Which begs the question…will they make you hi?
Fungi have been found growing in the ruins of reactors at Chernobyl! Do they glow in the dark too? Can fungi eliminate radioactive wastes? and feed the world? Does this need more study and publicity? Can these mushrooms be grown in North America? Will they glow here too? Please, more articles on fungi!
What does “grow in the forests south of Brazil mean?” 5 countries exist south of Brazil. Jack-o-lanterns also grow in the USA. Usually they appear in October, are a bright pumpkin color and grow in clumps. When young the gills are luminescent. If you find them during the day, carry them in a closet or something. It is well worth the effort. They are poisonous.
Haha Brabuss my thoughts exactly
But seriously, that is very interesting
Eat that shit.
I want to nom on glowing shrroooooomsss.
We have these in Australia - Not the green ones, but they look very much like them - glow white. I’ve had them on old logs in my garden in Bellingen - halfway up the NSW coast
wow, can you eat those?, does it make you glow too?, who knows, that one way to find out where those glowing things at night! LOL
“green with envy!”
[...] con el fenómeno de la bioluminiscencia, el efecto de olas que brillan con luz azul es un fenómeno completamente natural y de [...]
dirty rotten pranks dot comm has stink B’s that smell just like these things.
They glow for the same reason that lighning bugs and jellyfish light up. The enzyme “luciferase”. Light is produced by the oxidation of luciferin (a pigment), sometimes involving adenosine triphosphate (ATP). The rates of this reaction between luciferin and oxygen are extremely slow until they are catalyzed by luciferase, often mediated by the presence of calcium ions (an analog of muscle contraction). The reaction catalyzed by firefly luciferase takes place in two steps:
luciferin + ATP → luciferyl adenylate + PPi
luciferyl adenylate + O2 → oxyluciferin + AMP + light
The reaction is very energy efficient: nearly all of the energy input into the reaction is transformed into light. As a comparison, the incandescent light bulb loses about 90% of its energy to heat.
Hope ya’ll learned sumthin’ today!
cool…reminiscent of my home
During the 1980s Jack o Lantern Glowing Mushroom enzymes used in a super secret guidance systems in missles .So the story goes! Dont know how though!
In 1980s the lumesicnenece of jack oLaternas mushrooms were somehow used in missle guidence systems I understand how??? Thats a secret!
Holy smokes! That’s amazing. Like the comments above - I’m curious to know if they’re edible.
not a good idea to eat bioluminescent fungi of any species. These are Mycena, which have many toxic species within the genus.
There are several species of bioluminescent fungi that can be found all over the world. You can even grow your own. Check out http://www.sporeworks.com where they have Omphalotus nidiformis culture available for sale. They aren’t easy to grow if you don’t know what you’re doing, but it’s possible.
And no, they’re not psychoactive, so eating them would likely get you a hospital trip or worse…
As far as fungus in the ruins of Chernobyl, no they don’t glow. They are darker pigmented as a result of the radiation, and they seem to “eat” the radiation. I’m not sure if they are actually cleaning up the radiation though.
When it comes to cleanup, though, you can’t beat fungus. Paul Stamets has used Oyster mushrooms to clean up a toxic waste site. The toxic waste site invited four companies to come out and clean up the site, each with their own section to work on. The mushrooms cleaned up the toxic waste better than any of the other methods, and when it was done, the mushrooms were the only thing left to “clean up”, whereas two of the other methods made a mess that had to be cleaned up due to the byproducts of their methods.
Mushrooms will save the world.
Don’t be fooled, the pictures above were made with long-exposure photography. The actual light is very, very weak. But still, bioluminescence is cool. I saw similar pictures of genetically engineered tobacco plants…
Say what you want about toxicity, but it’s that toxicity that makes psychedelic mushrooms (’shrooms) psychedelic. It’s the body’s defenses against the toxicity that causes the ‘trip.’ Also, from the little research I’ve done on ‘magic mushrooms,’ the ld-50 is relatively low; you would vomit long before you ever reached a toxic level. They’re still much safer than alcohol. Of course you shouldn’t drive on ’shrooms either, but they don’t turn you into a belligerent buffoon.
I have seen bioluminescent fungi in Ontario. This is not something as unique as this article presumes…it has been called Foxfire for years.
These are most likely mycena chlorophos found in areas like Japan, Vietnam, and in select parts of central america. They grow best in soils with a pH of 4 which means that they thrive in the acidic soils of rainforests. There are about 33 known species of the bioluminescent mushrooms, some of which are edible (but do not recommend consumption) but most are toxic. Mycena Cyanorrhiza contains psilocybin
I highly doubt it was the exposure, as I have seen a tree do the same thing and I am in New York…
get outside more =]
Just like in Fallout 3
We have this in Iowa. I saw it several years ago. I always thought that I was crazy, seeing something glow in the woods at night until the local newspaper ran an article about this fall.
If I eat them, will it recharge my batteries?
emmmmm shrooms
OLD!! These were SOOOO in ‘A Bugs Life’ back in 1997…he he he!!
atomic radiation……………………
I saw bioluminescent fungus in the forests on the northern Pacific coast of North America, where I grew up. That was more like a mold, though, not mushrooms.