Growth, Differentiation and Sexuality

Mycology, the study of fungi, originated as a subdiscipline of botany and was a descriptive discipline, largely neglected as an experimental science until the early years of this century. A seminal paper by Blakeslee in 1904 provided evidence for self-incompatibility, termed "heterothallism", and stimulated interest in studies related to the control of sexual reproduction in fungi by mating-type specificities. Soon to follow was the demonstration that sexually reproducing fungi exhibit Mendelian inheritance and that it was possible to conduct formal genetic analysis with fungi. The names Burgeff, Kniep and Lindegren are all associated with this early period of fungal genetics research. These studies and the discovery of penicillin by Fleming, who shared a Nobel Prize in 1945, provided further impetus for experimental research with fungi. Thus began a period of interest in mutation induction and analysis of mutants for bio­ chemical traits. Such fundamental research, conducted largely with Neurospora crassa, led to the one gene: one enzyme hypothesis and to a second Nobel Prize for fungal research awarded to Beadle and Tatum in 1958. Fundamental research in biochemical genetics was extended to other fungi, especially to Saccharomyces cerevisiae, and by the mid-1960s fungal systems were much favored for studies in eukaryotic molecular biology and were soon able to compete with bacterial systems in the molecular arena.

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Vegetative processes and growth 1 Fungal cell types K.J. Boyce and A. Andrianapoulous 2 Organelle inheritance in budding yeast and other fungi L.J. García-Rodríguez, A.C. Gay, and L.A. Pon 3 Mitosis in filamentous fungi S. Harris 4 Apical wall biogenesis J.H. Sietsma and J.G.H. Wessels 5 The fungal cell wall J.P. Latgé and R. Calderone 6 Septation and cytokinesis in fungi J. Wendland and A. Walther 7 Re-wiring the network: understanding the mechanism and function of anastomosis in filamentous ascomycete fungi N. L. Glass and A. Fleißner 8 Heterogenic incompatibility in fungi K. Esser 9 Programmed cell death in fungi B.C.-K. Lu 10 Senescence and longevity H.D. Osiewacz and A. Hamann Signals in growth and development 11Autoregulatory signals in mycelial fungi U. Ugalde 12 Pheromone action in the fungal groups Chytridiomycota, and Zygomycota, and in the Oomycota C. Schimek and J. Wöstemeyer 13 Photomorphogenesis and gravitropism L. Corrochano and P. Galland Reproductive Processes 14 Asexual sporulation in mycelial fungi R. Fischer and U. Kües 15 Regulation of sexual development in filamentous ascomycetes (Mating types, pheromones) R. Debuchy and G. Turgeon 16 Fruiting body development in ascomycetes S. Pöggeler, M. Nowrousian, and U. Kück 17 Mating type genes of the basidiomycetes L.A. Casselton and M.P. Challen 18 Regulatory and structural networks, orchestrating mating, dimorphism, cell shape, and pathogenesis in Ustilago M. Feldbrügge, M. Bölker, G. Steinberg, J. Kämper, and R. Kahmann 19 The emergence of fruiting bodies in basidiomyctes H.A.B. Wösten and J.G.H. Wessels 20 Meiosis in mycelial fungi D. Zickler Biosystematic Index Subject Index