Fascinating Fungi—Nicholas P. Money—Professor, Author, and Expert on Mycology and Microbiology

Finding Genius Podcast

Richard Jacobs

Medicine, Health & Fitness

4.4 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 18 March 2020

⏱️ 42 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Nicholas P. Money is a professor, author, and expert on mycology and microbes. He joins the podcast today to discuss a number of fascinating topics.

Tune in to learn about them all, including the following:

How fungi move so successfully without musculature
In what ways the reproductive lives of fungi are so unique
What role serious fungal infections play in human health each year, and the search for new forms of antifungal medications
How genetically modified fungi is used to develop some of the most common drugs in medicine, as well as industrially useful chemicals

As a first-year undergraduate attending the University of Bristol in the UK, Nicholas P. Money was captivated by descriptions of a vast group of organisms he'd hardly even heard of: fungi. Since then, he's passionately pursued a knowledge and understanding of how these organisms work, and has authored a number of books on microbes in general.

His area of expertise is in the biomechanics of fungi, which deal with the ways in which fungi move, grow, and reproduce. He dives into the details of his expertise on fungi and shares insights he's gained from a variety of research he's carried out in the field.

This includes the distance and hydrostatic pressure with which spores are released by fungi, how microscopic filaments on fungi manage to penetrate some of the toughest material that exists, and so much more.

Learn more at https://www.themycologist.com/.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Forget frequently asked questions.
0:02.0	Common sense, common knowledge, or Google.
0:05.0	How about advice from a real genius?
0:07.0	95% of people in any profession are good enough to be qualified and licensed.
0:11.0	5% go above and beyond. They become very good at what they do, but only 0.1% are real Jesus.
0:18.0	Richard Jacobs has made it his life's mission to find them for you. He hunts down and interviews geniuses in every field,
0:25.0	sleep science, cancer, stem cells, ketogenic diets, and more. Here come the geniuses.
0:30.3	This is the Finding Genius Podcast.
0:33.0	That is Richard Jacobs.
0:35.0	Hello, this is Richard Jacobs with the Finding Genius Podcast.
0:41.0	My goal is 3-fold. I want to find the people in their fields that are really
0:45.6	the experts, the geniuses, those are probably at least one in a hundred, if not one in a thousand.
0:50.4	I also want to ask some questions that they don't typically get asked because that makes for a better interview I think and you know why listen to the same thing they may have been asked a thousand times let's see if we can do something different and I want to inform listeners and give them really interesting stuff they may not hear.
1:04.4	So those are my goals and today I have Nicholas P. Money, he's a professor.
1:08.8	And I had him on before.
1:10.1	He's the author of a book called The Selfish Ape, which I've been making my way through.
1:15.0	It's an excellent book.
1:16.0	And today we're going to talk about his other big area in his life, and that's studying fungi.
1:21.0	He's been doing that for many years researching at Miami University. So we
1:25.3	have we talked about that. So Nick, thanks for coming again. Yeah, good to talk with you
1:29.5	again, Richard. Yeah, what first attracted you to consider fungi and mushrooms?
1:34.0	How long ago?
	...

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