

Preface 



A 



lthough study of the physiology of the fungi has not 

 kept pace with that of, for example, bacterial metabolism, it has in 

 recent decades had much the same development. It seems fair to say 

 that there have been two disparate types of study. Research on some 

 problems — reproduction, parasitism, development — has been, with sig- 

 nificant but not very numerous exceptions, descriptive. At the other 

 extreme, it has been possible to develop basic biochemical knowledge 

 on the implicit assumption that the microbial cell is a small bag of 

 enzymes which only require to be extracted and enumerated. Our 

 need now is to extend the valuable results of the abstract analytical 

 study to the type of problem that has remained in the descriptive, 

 natural history, stage. 



This, however, is for the future. We work with what we have, and 

 it is the purpose of this book to summarize and organize our knowledge 

 of the physiology of the fungi, indicating whenever possible some of 

 the problems that lie immediately ahead. If there is one guiding prin- 

 ciple, it is that the fungi, however unusual or unique they may be as 

 functioning intact organisms, can be studied at the cellular and molecu- 

 lar levels only by taking account of the findings of other disciplines, 

 particularly bacterial physiology. This is the point of view of com- 

 parative biochemistry. No doubt, in a decade or two, some more 

 useful principle of organization will emerge, but for the present an 



