DailyDirt: Useful Fungus

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Fungus is a fascinating form of life. Mold grows almost anywhere, and it can survive some pretty extreme conditions. However, more often than not, it's considered a nuisance that needs to be killed and removed. Some mushroom-lovers have come up with some ways to make fungus useful for us -- taking advantage of how well mold can grow. Here are just a few examples of fungus that isn't for eating, but still serves us. If you'd like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.
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Filed Under: 3d printing, biology, fungus, furniture, insulation, mold, mushrooms, myceliumchair, radioactivity


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  • identicon
    Anonymous, 7 Jan 2014 @ 5:21pm

    I see a z-grade horror movie coming out of that first one.
    And the next two, well, the Smurfs have known about those for years.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 7 Jan 2014 @ 6:51pm

      Re:

      The Smurfs only repurposed ordinary mushrooms. The Telvanni are the ones who truly mastered mycological engineering.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 7 Jan 2014 @ 8:39pm

    Super insulation(thermal/acoustic) on the horizon.

    SEAgel made from Agar(aka vegetable gelatin), yes dude you can produce a lot of things using gelatin, not just deserts.

    Funny how things are made, you freeze Agar then produce a vacuum strong enough so water instead of liquifying sublimates(freeze-drying) and tada! you have something with almost the same properties of aerogel, which can be composted use no harsh chemicals and it is much much more resistant than aerogel since it doesn't crumble as easily, the problem with it may be that it is made out of a natural substance that fungus love to eat.

    Other use of microorganisms that may be for mining metals.

    All living things are incredible advanced factories.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    J, 8 Jan 2014 @ 6:37am

    Mushrooms are extremely helpful in reducing your social alcohol consumption too :

    Psilocybin does not play well with alcohol. At small doses, the alcohol might override the psilocybin, meaning you wasted your mushrooms. At larger doses, the psilocybin negates the alcohol, but meaning you wasted your drink and maybe weaken your mushrooms. Worse, you might drink alcohol excessively because the psilocybin masks the effects. Never drink on mushrooms.

    I've thus found the ultimate excuse for not drinking at crazy parties is :
    "Sorry, I cannot drink. Alcohol might weaken my mushroom trip."

    It'd work as an excuse even if you weren't on mushrooms of course, but small sub-hallucinogenic mushroom doses will make you quite happy and "on" for the party, but not sluggish or groggy like pot. Inexpensive low calorie night out. :)

    Do not take fully hallucinogenic doses if you actually want to party because most people become withdrawn from overstimulation when they start hallucinating. Always carry healthy low or zero calorie food items like celery, tangerines, cherries, etc. when using hallucinogens because the stimulate your appetite, like pot. And it's funny feeding tasty fruit to the nutters on MDMA.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 8 Jan 2014 @ 2:47pm

    "but presumably it isn't as toxic"

    You might want to reconsider that whole "natural = non-toxic" assumption when it comes to mushrooms.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Bergman (profile), 19 Apr 2016 @ 1:41pm

    Don't assume

    Don't assume that fungus must be less toxic -- there are some true horrors in that direction. Granted, I can't imagine someone using the nastier forms of fungus as building materials, but blanket statements are no one's friend when it comes to the safety of fungi.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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