Kingdom Fungi
Multicellular eukaryotes that absorb their food.
A mushroom on dead wood
Mushrooms are fungi. One grows on a fallen, dead log.
How do you think a mushroom gets its food?
What this lesson covers
The idea
Fungi are mostly multicellular eukaryotes with chitin cell walls that cannot make their own food, absorbing nutrients through fine filaments forming a mycelium; unicellular yeast is placed in fungi because of its chitin wall.
A mushroom on dead wood
Mushrooms are fungi. One grows on a fallen, dead log.
How do you think a mushroom gets its food?
- It absorbs nutrients from dead or decaying matter
- It makes food from sunlight
- It catches small animals to eat
How a fungus feeds
Press Next step.
Not plants, not animals
Fungi cannot make their own food, so they are heterotrophs. They take in nutrients through very fine filaments. Most are many-celled, but yeast has a single cell and is still counted as a fungus because of its chitin wall.
Fungi are mostly multicellular eukaryotes with chitin cell walls that cannot make their own food, absorbing nutrients through fine filaments forming a mycelium; unicellular yeast is placed in fungi because of its chitin wall.
Notes
Fungi are mostly multicellular eukaryotes with chitin walls that absorb nutrients through a mycelium; yeast is a unicellular fungus.
Check yourself
What are the cell walls of fungi made of?
What is the network of fine filaments in a fungus called?
How do fungi get their nutrients?
Why is the unicellular yeast placed in fungi?
- Cellulose. Plants have a rigid cell wall made of cellulose.
- Chitin — correct. Yes!
- Water. A cell wall is a firm structure. The book says fungal walls are made of chitin.
- Thallus. A thallus is the simple body of thallophytes, not of fungi.
- Rhizoid. Rhizoids are the root-like structures of bryophytes, not the filaments of fungi.
- Mycelium — correct. Yes!
- They absorb them from dead or decaying matter — correct. Yes!
- They make food by photosynthesis. Fungi do not make their own food.
- They swallow whole prey. The book says fungi absorb nutrients through fine filaments.
- It has green leaves. Yeast is a single cell. Fungi do not have leaves.
- Its cell wall is made of chitin — correct. Yes!
- It lives in water. The book gives the chitin cell wall as the reason.