A wider currency was given to this view of a mutually advantageous growth
by de Bary[210]. He followed Reinke in refusing to accept as satisfactory
the theory of simple parasitism, and adduced the evident healthy life of
the algal cells—the alleged victims of the fungus—as incompatible with
the parasitic condition. He proposed the happily descriptive designation
of a _Symbiosis_ or conjoint life which was mostly though not always, nor
in equal degree, beneficial to each of the partners or symbionts.
_b._ DIFFERENT FORMS OF ASSOCIATION. The type of association between the
two symbionts varies in different lichens. Bornet[211], in describing the
development of the thallus in certain members of the Collemaceae, found
that though as a rule the two elements of the thallus, as in some species
of _Collema_ itself, persisted intact side by side, there was in other
members of the genus an occasional parasitism: short branches from the
main hyphae applied themselves by their tips to some cell of the _Nostoc_
chain (Fig. 9). The cell thus seized upon began to increase in size, and
the plasma became granular and gathered at the side furthest away from
the point of attachment. Finally the contents were used up, and nothing
was left but an empty membrane adhering to the fungus hypha. In another
species the hypha penetrated the cell. These instances of parasitism are
most readily seen towards the edge of the thallus where growth is more
active; towards the centre the attached cells have become absorbed, and
only the shortened broken chains attest their disappearance. The other
cells of the chains remain uninjured.
[Illustration: Fig. 9. _Physma chalazanum_ Arn. Cells of _Nostoc_ chains
penetrated and enlarged by hyphae × 950 (after Bornet).]
In _Synalissa_, a small shrubby gelatinous genus, the hypha, as described
by Bornet and by Hedlund[212], pierces the outer wall of the gelatinous
alga (_Gloeocapsa_) and swells inside to a somewhat globose haustorium
which rests in a depression of the plasma (Fig. 10). The alga, though
evidently undamaged, is excited to a division which takes place on a
plane that passes through the haustorium; the two daughter-cells then
separate, and in so doing free themselves from the hypha.
[Illustration: Fig. 10. _Synalissa symphorea_ Nyl. Algae (_Gloeocapsa_)
with hyphae from the internal thallus × 480 (after Bornet).]
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