Researchers from several Chinese institutions have discovered a new giant fungus in the forests of Yunnan Province in southwestern China. It is characterized by white reproductive bodies that can reach up to half a meter in height, and some specimens weigh about 2.2 kilograms.
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These characteristics led researchers to name it "Diagonus Rex," where "Rex" in Latin means "king," a reference to its exceptional size.
Despite the importance of size in this discovery, the greatest value does not depend on it; the analyses carried out on the giant fungus, and published in the journal Frontiers in Fungal Biology, opened the door to an exciting hypothesis linking its evolution to the extinction of the dinosaurs about 66 million years ago.
The story of this discovery began when researchers found a giant fungus growing at the bases of oak trees, on top of decaying roots or dead tree trunks in the forests of China’s Yunnan province.
After examining samples of it and studying its white reproductive bodies, they found that its morphological characteristics in terms of size and weight were unprecedented. They then moved to a third step in their study, which was to compare its genetic material with data from hundreds of other fungi to determine its position on the evolutionary tree and its relationship to known fungi.
From this comparison, the researchers concluded that they were dealing with a new species, which they named "Diagonus rex," belonging to a new family called "Diagonus," of which no other members are known so far.
The most exciting part of this study came when the researchers estimated the age of the lineage. Their genetic analysis showed that the species diverged from its closest known relatives about 65 million years ago, about a million years after the asteroid impact that caused the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs.
The researchers linked this timing to the environmental changes that followed the extinction, such as the increase in plant remains and decaying wood, and hypothesized that these conditions may have provided new opportunities for the development of some fungi, without proving a direct causal relationship.
Why did the fungus evolve to this size?
Regarding the reasons for the fungus's development to this size, researchers believe that the height of the reproductive bodies may give it an advantage in dense forests, as it helps it release its spores over layers of fallen leaves and plant remains close to the ground, which may improve its chances of spreading.
At the same time, the researchers acknowledge that this potential advantage comes at a cost; building a reproductive body weighing more than two kilograms requires a significant investment of resources and energy.
The researchers concluded that this size may have evolved because the benefits of spore dispersal outweighed the cost.
However, the researchers emphasize that this is an explanatory hypothesis, as the study did not experimentally prove that longer bodies spread spores over greater distances, nor that they give fungi an advantage in survival and reproduction.
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