Chromogenesis in Cultures of Sporotricha

Abstract

The pigmentation of fungi has long attracted attention for various reasons. Many are highly colored and therefore readily attract the eye and excite the interest of the observer. To the systematist, color has furnished an easy means of classification, and biologic nomenclature is laden with color words. It is generally admitted however that a color basis is very unsatisfactory for purposes of classifying or naming organisms. As Buller' states, it would be interesting if some law of progressive coloration could be discovered; but no attempt to work out the phylogenesis of the color of spores has yet been made. Buller thinks that colorlessness is the primitive condition of spores and that pigments are only gradually developed, probably by a series of mutations.