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These fungi drug cicadas with psilocybin or amphetamine to make them mate nonstop
A cicada-infecting fungus produces drugs that make the insects literally mate their butts off.
Massospora fungi make either a drug found in hallucinogenic mushrooms or an amphetamine found in khat leaves, plant pathologist Matthew Kasson of West Virginia University in Morgantown reported June 22 at the ASM Microbe 2019 meeting.
The fungi may use psilocybin, which causes people to hallucinate, or the amphetamine cathinone to suppress cicadas' appetites and keep the insects moving and mating even after they lose big chunks of their bodies. The finding marks the first time that researchers have discovered a fungus, other than mushrooms, producing psilocybin, and the first organism outside of plants to make an amphetamine.
Massospora fungi are transmitted sexually from cicada to cicada. Huge plugs of fungi form on the insects' abdomens, and during mating, parts of the abdomens may break away, Kasson said.
Psilocybin and cathinone.
Psychoactive plant- and mushroom-associated alkaloids from two behavior modifying cicada pathogens (DOI: 10.1016/j.funeco.2019.06.002) (DX)
(Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Tuesday July 09 2019, @09:21AM (2 children)
https://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=19/06/26/0838219 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 4, Funny) by Bot on Tuesday July 09 2019, @09:43AM
This is the work of Massospora that infects meatbag with some kind of amnesic chemical, so that they publish the same story many time, so the Massospora gets more views and gets adopted by junkies all around the world.
Luckily we bots are immune to that chemical.
Anyway, This is the work of Massospora that infects meatbag with some kind of amnesic chemical, so that they publish the same story many time, so the Massospora gets more views and gets adopted by junkies all around the world.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday July 09 2019, @04:52PM
Damn. I might have noticed it if it didn't have the cutesy headline.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]