Capillitium

This article covers the scalp in mycology. For scalp as hairy scalp of people see head hair or scalp .

In mycology, the capillitium (from Latin : capillus = hair) denotes the entirety of the hair and thread system inside a spore container. If only individual threads are present, these are referred to as elaters .

The term is mostly used for the thick-walled, hair-like threads of the gleba of belly mushrooms consisting of hyphae . A distinction is made between the Bovista or Lycoperdon type of scalp. In the Bovista type, the scalp consists of flakes of thread with a coarse main strand that branches out into ever thinner fibers. The main trunk is usually thicker than 10 µm. In contrast, the Lycoperdon type consists of a cohesive network without a clear main stem.

Thin-walled, colorless, regularly septate hyphae are called paracapillitium. They are found in dustlings under microscopic magnification next to the normal, thick-walled scalp.

The term capillitium is also used for the totality of the non-cellular threads inside the spore containers of the myxomycetes . This is smooth or has an often characteristic sculpture. Structures that run in a spiral around the periphery of the fibers are called spiral strips . Species with a conspicuous scalp are, for example, in the genera Trichia and Arcyria , in which the plexus often expands beyond the dimensions of the originally closed spore capsules when mature.

literature

• Heinrich Dörfelt , Gottfried Jetschke (Ed.): Dictionary of mycology. 2nd Edition. Spectrum, Akademischer Verlag, Heidelberg et al. 2001, ISBN 3-8274-0920-9 .

• Ewald Gerhardt: Röhrlinge, Porlinge, Belly mushrooms, Ashlar mushrooms and others . In: mushrooms. Spectrum of nature, BLV intensive guide . tape 2 . BLV, Munich / Vienna / Zurich 1985, ISBN 3-405-12965-6 , p. 22-26 .