Slime molds are unicellular protist organisms that were previously classified as fungi until they were discovered to be unrelated. Slime molds are lacking the general characteristics of fungi such as having chitin in their walls and not being able to move in any form of their life cycle. The specific slime mold species that will be experimented, Physarum Polycephalum, is able to live in the haploid and diploid form. In starvation, the diploid will sporulate and the haploid spores then sexually reproduce to increase genetic variation in the species as if favored by natural selection. The diploid form is able to grow plasmodium which is the characteristic appearance of slime molds, forming large branching structures that expand across a surface.
Research has been performed on this species and scientists have made conclusions about its intelligence, organization and memory. It has been shown to exhibit a collective behavior where several single celled organisms cluster and form temporary tissues that move together in times of resource deprivation. Also slime molds have been found to grow in any direction to find food, then upon discovery of a food source, reduces the non beneficial branches that did not land on a food source and thickens the successful branch.
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