At the bottom of the image above you can see the spore-like 'auxiliary cells'. It becomes clear where this fungus gets it name when you find a true spore!

Mid-week #mycorrhiza 🍄 A visit from an artist yesterday was the perfect excuse to spend some time admiring this very beautiful arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus: 𝘎𝘪𝘨𝘢𝘴𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘢 𝘮𝘢𝘳𝘨𝘢𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘢 (pictured here colonising rice roots) #mycosky #fungi #microscopy

From the Crop Science Centre in Cambridge to farmers' fields in India: check out the translational work of Cereal Symbiosis Lab member Emily Servanté, just published in THE CONVERSATION theconversation.com/how-im-helpi... @cropscicentre.bsky.social @camplantsci.bsky.social

🧵 Just out in Cell after more than 10 years in the making! 🎓 www.cell.com/cell/fulltex... Plants and animals evolve radically different body plans. Do they also operate under fundamentally different molecular evolutionary constraints during organ formation? @cellpress.bsky.social

La Forêt hyperconnectée avec Francis Martin 🍄🌳 👉A retrouver en rediffusion : www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhEh...

Mid-week #mycorrhiza 🍄 A tangentially-festive sample this week: arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi colonising the root cells of Ivy 🌿🎄☃️ #mycosky #festive #fungi

Mid-week #mycorrhiza 🍄 Motivated by a seminar from @tomthirkell.bsky.social, I've delved back into my image archives of mycorrhizal fungi in random plant species. This beautifully bunchy fungal arbuscule in a buttercup root needed sharing!🔬🏵️ #mycosky #fungi #microscopy #outreach

Had a great visit to @cropscicentre.bsky.social and @camplantsci.bsky.social, and a very nice stay at St John’s college. Thanks to @paszkowskilab.bsky.social for hosting me!

IN BRIEF: Aeschynomene’s Shortcut: A Receptor-Like Cytoplasmic Kinase Drives Nod-Independent Nodule Formation (Min-Yao Jhu, Chai Hao Chiu) doi.org/10.1093/plce... #PlantScience @aspbofficial

"Innovation should serve all, not just those who can afford it." Hear how Crop Science Centre researchers @cam.ac.uk & partners are rethinking how we grow food for a sustainable future. #COP30 @cambridgebiosci.bsky.social @paszkowskilab.bsky.social @jmhibberd.bsky.social

It's been a busy time in the Paszkowski lab! First, a pre-print on how rice distinguishes friend (AM fungi)🍄 from foe (pathogens)👾: doi.org/10.1101/2025... And second, a review on single-cell omic approaches to understand the spatially and temporally complex AM symbiosis 🔬: doi.org/10.1093/jxb/...

🍄 Fungi Field Day is almost here! 🍄 Save the date: Saturday 4 October 🍄 Come along from 10am to 4pm Celebrate all things fungi with art, crafts, face painting, talks, forays and games - there's something for everyone! We look forward to welcoming you! 🌿 #CUBG #FungiFieldDay #CambridgeEvents

I’m super happy to present the first discoveries of the RIKEN-Cambridge Joint Crop Symbiosis Research Team, based in Japan 🇯🇵 doi.org/10.1101/2025... A thread 👇

I'll be presenting Wed 17th 11:30 at IMMM2025 in Munich in our labs work on the role of the D14L-SMAX1 module in the arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis, and why we think it operates in two distinct roles (regulating the common symbiosis pathway and independent of it in the cortex). #immm2025

🍄 One month until Fungi Field Day 2025!! 🍄 Held on UK Fungus Day (4th October) @cubotanicgarden.bsky.social, this event celebrates the fungal kingdom, featuring science, games, walks, talks, face-painting and much more for all ages. Please spread the word! www.botanic.cam.ac.uk/whats-on/fun...

The arum type arbuscules

Beautiful microscopy of beautiful arbuscules

Excited to share our new @nature.com paper mapping global mycorrhizal richness and rarity, led by Michael Van Nuland. Over 90% of richness hotspots lie outside protected areas: a critical gap in conservation. Proud to contribute as part of the @spun.earth consortium! www.nature.com/articles/s41...

She also plugged this innovation: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.... The AMSlide for noninvasive time‐lapse imaging of arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis - McGaley - 2025 - Journal of Microscopy - Wiley Online Library

Uta Paszkowski expands on the arbuscular mycorrhizal theme with a cool spatial transcriptome method to better resolve dynamics during colonization of rice. Can see key transporter transcripts accumulating in arbuscules. #2025ISMPMI

Mid-week #mycorrhiza 🍄 From a primary school workshop: a mystery arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus in mystery plant. Sometimes fun to have no information about what you are looking at 🚸 #outreach #mycosky #fungi

I'll be at @ipgsa2025.bsky.social in 10 days time - come find me at poster 102 to discuss what we've learned in rice about the role of KL & its negative regulator SMAX1 in root development, mycorrhizal symbiosis and germination, as well as our efforts to take chemical control of this pathway.

A thread of our go-to outreach activities from @jenmcgaley.bsky.social. Worth a look if you have an event coming up! Particular favourite: the online game, 'The Adventures of a Friendly Fungus' 👇🕹️

🧪🧬Should we reignite genetic manipulation attempts on #arbuscular #mycorrhizal #fungi? Our review in @cp-trendsmicrobiol.bsky.social suggests the time is ripe. With: Midge Woodward @paszkowskilab.bsky.social @alexdallaire.bsky.social Open access🔗 doi.org/10.1016/j.ti... #scicomm

Festival of Plants 2025: great atmosphere, lots of visitors, and so much enthusiasm for mycorrhiza! Next in the outreach calendar: the Fungi Field Day, 4th October, Cambridge University Botanic Gardens. Save the date! 🍄🍄🍄

Our favourite fungus in our favourite plant 😍

Celebrating Deni's Masters Viva, and the birthday of our acting Director Prof Uta Paszkowski 🎉🎂👏

A whole special issue dedicated to FUNGI!!! Well worth a look 😍

Nearly time for the Festival of Plants 2025!!! We'll be in the Pop-up Plant Science tent with microscopes, crafts, games and much more mycorrhizal fun🔬🖍️🎨🧩 @paszkowskilab.bsky.social @camplantsci.bsky.social @cropscicentre.bsky.social #mycosci #fungi #plants

Mid-week #mycorrhiza 🍄 Been looking at the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus Gigaspora margarita this week. Not only does it form ENORMOUS spores, but also bunches of knobbly 'auxiliary cells'. Can't find a description of auxiliary cell function anywhere...does anyone know what they do? #mycosci #fungi

Sharing some of my own #mycorrhiza #microscopy from @paszkowskilab.bsky.social Rhizophagus irregularis inside a rice lateral root (plant & fungal CWs stained with calcofluor white, 400x mag)

Mid-week #mycorrhiza 🍄 Some chunky hyphae and arbuscules of the mycorrhizal fungus Rhizophagus irregularis, running along the length of a rice root. Coloured by depth in the root. #mycosky #fungi #microscopy

Congratulations to Uta Paszkowski from @cropscicentre.bsky.social - elected to the National Academy of Sciences, USA in recognition of her significant contributions to understanding symbiotic relationships between plants & fungi. @cambridgebiosci.bsky.social @paszkowskilab.bsky.social

Mid-week #mycorrhiza 🍄 Roots are busy places... here's a rice root packed with mycorrhizal fungal arbuscules 🔬

Mid-week #mycorrhiza 🍄 No rice this week: instead a beautiful arbuscule formed by native arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus (identity unknown) within a Plantago root. This animation takes you through a z-stack 🔬

Mid-week #mycorrhiza 🍄 Neighbouring arbuscules formed by the mycorrhizal fungus Rhizophagus irregularis. Makes the rice root look like an apartment block full of fungal inhabitants 🌃🌇

Mid-week #mycorrhiza 🍄 Some chunky hyphae of the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus Rhizophagus irregularis forming fungal pipelines inside a rice root. Coloured by depth in the root 🔬

Registration is open for the 7th International Molecular Mycorrhiza Meeting (iMMM 2025), 16th - 18th September 2025 VENUE: Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, BioCenter, Planegg-Martinsried near Munich, Germany​. #iMMM2025 www.genetik.bio.lmu.de/immm-2025/in...

Amazing to think how many of these exist in the roots of a single plant, let alone the plant communities all around us...🤯

A much needed discussion about the efficacy of soil inoculation - we'll be watching!

Mycorrhizal inoculation success depends on soil health and crop productivity @femsjournals.bsky.social Microbiol Lett by @idorog.bsky.social @steffilutz.bsky.social et al @mvanderheijden.bsky.social @sfbender.bsky.social @nboden.bsky.social @kschlaeppi.bsky.social academic.oup.com/femsle/advan...

Our Public Engagement webpage has had an update! Take a look to see what our lab have been up to 😁 festivals, talks, articles, workshops and plenty of fun and games 👾🌻🍄 www.plantsci.cam.ac.uk/research/gro... @camplantsci.bsky.social @cropscicentre.bsky.social #outreach #sciart #education

A must read for AM symbiosis afficionados nph.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...

#MicroscopyMonday - Nicotiana root colonized by arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi. Hyphal fusions (anastomoses) are visible on the root surface.

Some maize mycorrhiza for your Thursday morning

Arbuscule on the front cover! Happy to have our paper included in this Botanical Microscopy Special Issue of the Journal of Microscopy @royalmicrosoc.bsky.social 🔬 onlinelibrary.wiley.com/toc/13652818...

Hello Bluesky! This is the account of the Cereal Symbiosis Lab run by Prof. Uta Paszkowski at @cropscicentre.bsky.social @camplantsci.bsky.social, researching arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis in cereal crops 🍄🌾🌽 Looking forward to reconnecting with the mycorrhiza community on this new platform!