Comparison of plant and fungal gravitropic responses using imitational modelling

The mechanisms of gravity perception are still hypothetical, but there are sufficient data from experiments with plants to enable mathematical modelling to imitate the behaviour of gravitropic response systems. We have a much less complete picture of gravitropic kinetics in agaric mushrooms. However, some existing mathematical models which imitate plant responses are in principle universal because their conceptual components are not limited to any specific cellular entities. In this work we have used such models to compare plant and fungal gravitropism, using recently acquired kinetic data from the agarics Coprinus cinereius and Flammulina velutipes. The results show striking similarities between plants and fungi. First, it is evident that the basic assumptions of the plant models are logically applicable to fungi. Secondly, the mechanism of bending is the same (differential growth of opposite flanks of the growing organ). Thirdly, the distribution of growth seems very similar: in both plants and fungi growth of the organ is most intensive just behind the apex and is almost absent at the apex and at the base. Fourthly, in both fungi and plants the gravitropic response exhibits a substantial time delay suggesting that many time-consuming processes are involved in reception, transduction and realization of gravitropic stimuli. Important differences in plant and fungal gravitropism kinetics were: (i) the agaric stem apex always returned to the vertical, whereas some plant organs show stable plagiogravitropic growth; (ii) inflections were usually seen in C. cinereus stem gravitropism time courses suggesting that a curvature compensation process delayed bending for a time; (iii) C. cinercus stems very rarely overshot or oscillated around the vertical although many plant subjects oscillate and the (limited) data for F. velutipes showed a single, exaggerated overshoot and oscillation. In this latter case, experimental modelling with parameters characteristic of a low level of perception improved the fit to the F. velutipes data, indicating that the two fungi may differ in this factor. Application of the plant models focused future research attention on the urgent need for data bearing on angle-response and acceleration–response relationships in fungi, and their detection–level thresholds for gravitational acceleration. Since the modelling also highlighted some fundamental kinetic differences between the only two fungi for which sufficient data are available at the moment, it is also clear that detailed observations need to be made of gravitropism kinetics in a larger number and wider range of fungi.