Mushroom Gills Cross Section Under the Microscope
Mushroom Gills (Cross Section), Agaricus
This is a section through the cap and gills of a mushroom, stained with safranin. It shows where mushrooms make their spores, on tiny club-shaped cells lining the gills.
This cross section cuts through the cap and gills of a mushroom (Agaricus), stained pink with Safranin. The thick cap tissue, called the pileus, sits on top, and dozens of thin gills, or lamellae, hang down from it like the pages of a book. The darker edge along each gill is the hymenium, the layer where club-shaped cells called basidia make spores. The pale middle of each gill is the trama, a core of woven fungal threads called hyphae. Having so many gills gives the mushroom a huge surface for making and releasing spores.
What to look for
- Cap (pileus): The tissue at the top that holds the gills.
- Gills (lamellae): Thin plates hanging down from the cap in rows.
- Hymenium: The layer of fertile cells along the surface of each gill.
- Basidia: Club-shaped cells in the hymenium that produce spores.
- Basidiospores: Tiny spores sitting on small points at the tips of the basidia.
- Trama: Woven threads (hyphae) in the middle of each gill.
Questions and answers
What do mushroom gills look like under a microscope?
Mushroom gills are thin plates with a core of woven fungal threads. Their surfaces are lined with club-shaped cells called basidia, each carrying a few tiny spores at its tip.
How do mushrooms reproduce?
Mushrooms release huge numbers of spores from their gills. The spores are carried by air, and if one lands in a good spot, it grows into new fungal threads that can eventually form a new mushroom.
Are mushrooms plants?
No. Mushrooms are fungi. They cannot make their own food by photosynthesis and instead absorb nutrients from their surroundings, and their cell walls contain chitin instead of cellulose.
- Category
- Microbiology
- Scan magnification
- 20x
- Stain
- Safranin
Viewing this slide in class
This is a scan of a real prepared slide, not a simulation or a drawing. On StudyScope you can pan from the whole slide down to individual structures, always in focus, and measure them in real micrometers with the calibrated ruler. Present it live and every student screen follows your view and annotations. Students join with a room code on Chromebooks, iPads, or any browser, with no accounts.