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Comment by tomohelix

My best guess is that the hole was there before the mushroom grew. It is hard to find a biological species that need so much iron in their metabolism to the point it evolved something that can dissolve pure metal in a matter of 1-2 months. Irons are often used in enzymes and usually the ratio is around a few iron atoms bounded in a structure of thousands or tens of thousands of carbons and hydrogen atoms. To use so much iron implied that mushroom is literally chock full of special enzymes and I doubt it actually is.

More likely, something broke a hole there and the mushroom grew on it and capitalized on the broken edges to scavenge some extra irons but it did not punch that hole by itself.

parent tomohelix 2 years ago

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