Acrasidae

Acrasidae is a family^[1] of slime molds which belongs to the protist group Percolozoa. The name acrasio- comes from the Greek Akrasia, meaning "acting against one's judgement." This group consists of cellular slime molds.

Some would also consider it as a kingdom unto itself, but the debate is as of yet unsettled.

The term "Acrasiomycota" has been used when the group was believed to be a fungus ("-mycota").

Reproduction

When resources, such as water or food become limiting, the amoeba will release pheromones such as acrasin to aggregate amoebal cells in preparation for movement as a large (thousands of cells) grex or pseudopod. When in the grex, the amoeboids reproduce sexually, resulting in fruit-like structures called spores, which develop into unicellular molds of the same species.

See also

• Acrasis rosea

References

1. ^ Roger AJ, Smith MW, Doolittle RF, Doolittle WF (1996). "Evidence for the Heterolobosea from phylogenetic analysis of genes encoding glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase". J. Eukaryot. Microbiol. 43 (6): 475–85. PMID 8976605. 

• C.J. Alexopolous, Charles W. Mims, M. Blackwell et al., Introductory Mycology, 4^th ed. (John Wiley and Sons, Hoboken NJ, 2004) ISBN: 0-471-52229-5

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