Farming helps slime mould spores survive

摘要

Slime moulds have added another skill to their impressive resume they practise a primitive form of farming. Slime moulds - or social amoebas, as biologists now prefer to call them -have been shown to find the shortest route through mazes and pick the most nutritious food from a buffet. These are impressive feats for an organism that lives most of its life as single cells, grazing on bacteria.