Defining individual size in the model filamentous fungus $\textit{Neurospora crassa}$

TL;DR

This study investigates how the reproductive units in Neurospora crassa fungi are structured and influenced by growth conditions, revealing that fungal individuality is dynamic and environment-dependent, impacting evolution and adaptation.

Contribution

It provides a direct measurement of reproductive units in Neurospora crassa and shows how their size and composition are affected by growth geometry and perturbations.

Findings

Reproductive units are sensitive to growth geometry.

RU size varies with environmental conditions.

Genotype distribution influences RU composition.

Abstract

It is challenging to apply the tenets of individuality to filamentous fungi: a fungal mycelium can contain millions of genetically diverse but totipotent nuclei, each capable of founding new mycelia. Moreover a single mycelium can potentially stretch over kilometers and it is unlikely that its distant parts share resources or have the same fitness. Here we directly measure how a single mycelium of the model ascomycete {\it Neurospora crassa} is patterned into Reproductive Units (RUs); subpopulations of nuclei that propagate together as spores, and function as reproductive individuals. The density of RUs is sensitive to the geometry of growth; we detect 50-fold smaller RUs when mycelia had expanding frontiers than when they were constrained to grow in one direction only. RUs fragmented further when the mycelial network was perturbed. In mycelia with expanding frontiers RU composition was strongly influenced by the distribution of genotypes early in development. Our results provide a concept of fungal individuality that is directly connected to reproductive potential, and therefore to theories of how fungal individuals adapt and evolve over time. Our data show that the size of reproductive individuals is a dynamic and environment-dependent property, even within apparently totally connected fungal mycelia.