Week 3

Most of this week has been spent doing research for my semester project. I've decided I would like to study plant endophytic fungi this semester. Plants often have symbiotic relationships with many different organisms. Jeremy's project is looking at bacterial endophytes in roots while I will be forcusing my attention on fungal endophytes in stems, leaves and flowers. 

The definition of an endophyte is a little hazy but most people agree that it is any organism, usually bacteria or fungi, that can live inside another without causing pathogenic symptoms. The endophytic organism can be a symbiote that benefits the host, like our gut bacteria that helps us absorb nutrients, or it can just be something that happens to live in the host. In some cases an organism that is a normally an endophyte can become pathogenic, such as when Staph aureus gets into a human's blood stream or if a plant begins to die.  

The first plants it was proven had endophytic fungi living between their cell walls were certain species of grasses and so most of the literature is about grasses, The gentleman that was working on a similar project last semester left behind a sack full of grass seeds known to harbor endophytes and I planted some of them earlier this week. Here is a photo: 

And here is one of the microtome I will be using to slice my plant samples for staining to see if I can find mycelium between the plant's cell walls. The potatoe is used to hold the sample in place so I can slice extremely thin slices off sample.