Such Misery...

Ken Ramos · Post by **Ken Ramos** » Tue Dec 25, 2007 1:21 pm

I have not ran across one of these in a while and as horrid as it is to some life forms, Cordyceps is a benefical immunosuppressant, used for heart and various other organ transplant operations. It can reduce the chance of rejection by the recipient of the transplanted organ or so I have read. Hey...I'm no brain surgon

Cordyceps infection
Canon EOS 30D
Manual mode/hand held
1/250 sec. @ f/10 ISO 125
Canon EF-S 60mm f/2.8 Macro USM
Canon 430EX Speedlite ETTL @ 1/3
Late Afternoon, cloudy/overcast

Though this is not the forum for it, I have my suspicions about bio-engineered immunosuppressant viruses. It seems that from researching such things, there are a lot of life forms which carry polydnaviruses, which if I am not mistaken, are also immunosuppressants. Cordyceps, however, is a fungal infection and has not mutated to higher animals as of yet, thank goodness!

JoanYoung · Post by **JoanYoung** » Tue Dec 25, 2007 1:29 pm

An extremely interesting and informative post Ken.

Ken Ramos · Post by **Ken Ramos** » Tue Dec 25, 2007 1:40 pm

Thanks Joan. Having a lot of time on my hands sometimes, leaves me with plenty of time to wander into the twilight zone and ponder about what the worlds governments are up to in bio-engineering and covert or clandestine if you will, biological weaponry. Yeah I guess I just made myself an enemy of the state. Oh look! One of those black Chevy Blazers just pulled up in the drive.

beetleman · Post by **beetleman** » Tue Dec 25, 2007 5:20 pm

Thats a creepy one Ken....is that an ant? Looks like a little body on its back with the thing coming out of its chest

Ken Ramos · Post by **Ken Ramos** » Tue Dec 25, 2007 5:57 pm

You know Doug, your right.

If the legs were just a bit farther up, it would look like a person on their back with a very large stroma erupting from their broken and ravaged chest area. I can just hear the cartilage snapping like a fresh stick of celery as the breast plate snaps and gives way to the rising of the fruiting body. The arms and legs griping the substrate, eyes rolled back, consciousness fading, as life departs the now numb body of the host.

Yeah, it's an ant. Thanks Doug!

beetleman · Post by **beetleman** » Wed Dec 26, 2007 7:45 am

"Chills going down my Spine"

I went to see the new Movie " I Am Legend" starring Will Smith. Great movie about science & cures gone wrong.

Ken Ramos · Post by **Ken Ramos** » Wed Dec 26, 2007 8:14 am

Yeah I heard about that. Something like the last man on earth kind of thing. You know, funny thing. A lot of science fiction has an uncanny way of becoming reality.

DaveW · Post by **DaveW** » Wed Dec 26, 2007 11:44 am

I would think stumbling across one of those in the dark was more likely to bring on rejection!

DaveW

Ken Ramos · Post by **Ken Ramos** » Wed Dec 26, 2007 12:31 pm

DaveW wrote:

I would think stumbling across one of those in the dark was more likely to bring on rejection!

Well it just could there Dave, especially if the fungi mutates to infect higher forms of life.

Just beware of the haploid stage of spore development.

Thanks Dave

Leif · Post by **Leif** » Wed Dec 26, 2007 1:13 pm

Nice find. I guess it is somewhat gruesome when you think about what is going on. Chinese traditional medicine uses Cordyceps sinensis, which grows on caterpillars. I do not know what the purported benefits are.

In the UK there are several Cordyceps species which emerge from buried insect larvae. C. canadensis and C. militaris are not uncommon. C. militaris can sometimes be quite prolific, presumably due to a fortuitous combination of weather and host.

The following are some small Hover Flies infected with a fungus that has colonised the entire body:

Unfortunately I do not know the species.

Ken Ramos · Post by **Ken Ramos** » Wed Dec 26, 2007 1:29 pm

An infection such as that shown in your photo would elude me, since I would be mainly looking for the presence of a stroma, maybe more than one or two. From what I gather, the infection in its many forms is each atuned to one insect species in paticular. For example that species of fungi which infects grasshoppers would not be found infecting moths, nor that of ants infecting caterpillars (Euascomycetes or caterpillar fungi) and the infection seems not to manifest itself with the same morphological characteristics in all species of insects. Some very strange but interesting fungi with a multitude of uses, so it seems.

Thanks Leif