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Mushrooms, moulds and yeasts are more closely related to animals than to plants. DNA studies show that fungi and animals share a common ancestor that is more recent than any they share with plants.

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For centuries fungi were classed as plants, because most of them, like plants, stay in one place. But fungi cannot photosynthesise. Like animals, they live on organic matter made by other living things; they digest it outside their bodies and absorb the nutrients. Like animals, they store energy as glycogen rather than starch, and their cell walls contain chitin, the same tough material found in insect shells. In 1987 the British biologist Thomas Cavalier-Smith grouped animals and fungi together as the opisthokonts, and DNA studies have supported him. The name, from the Greek for “rear pole”, refers to the single tail at the back of their swimming cells, such as animal sperm and the spores of primitive fungi called chytrids. Other groups, including plants, have swimming cells with one or more tails at the front.

Türkçe oku
Şapkalı mantarlar, küfler ve mayalar, soy bakımından bitkilerden çok hayvanlara yakındır. DNA çalışmalarına göre mantarlarla hayvanların ortak atası, ikisinin de bitkilerle paylaştığı ortak atadan daha yakın bir zamanda yaşadı.

Mantarlar yüzyıllar boyunca bitki sayıldı, çünkü çoğu bitkiler gibi olduğu yerden kıpırdamaz. Oysa mantarlar fotosentez yapamaz. Hayvanlar gibi, başka canlıların ürettiği organik maddeyle beslenirler; bu maddeyi bedenlerinin dışında sindirip besinleri emerler. Yine hayvanlar gibi enerjiyi nişasta olarak değil glikojen olarak depolarlar; hücre duvarlarında da böcek kabuklarındaki sert madde olan kitin bulunur. İngiliz biyolog Thomas Cavalier-Smith 1987'de hayvanları ve mantarları opisthokontlar adı altında bir araya getirdi; sonraki DNA çalışmaları da onu doğruladı. Ad, Yunanca “arka” ve “sırık” sözcüklerinden gelir ve bu canlıların yüzen hücrelerinin arkasındaki tek kamçıyı anlatır: Hayvanların sperm hücreleri de, kitrid denen ilkel mantarların sporları da böyle tek bir kamçıyla yüzer. Bitkiler de dâhil başka gruplarda ise yüzen hücrelerin kamçısı ya da kamçıları öndedir.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: Fungus
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