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Mycena luxperpetua (The Glow-in-the-Dark-Mushroom), is newly discovered species of rare bioluminescent fungi. Mycena luxperpetua was first discovered on the island of Puerto Rico in 2009, but has since been found in other equatorial regions such as Belize, Brazil, Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Malaysia, as well as Japan. This particular species of mushroom does not have have any hallucinogenic properties but it does emit a very bright yellow-green glow in the darkness. It has been found that Mycena luxperpetua emits a bioluminescent glow 24 hours a day; however, it is obviously most visible at night.

Structure and Function
Mycena luxperpetua has a number of distinctive features including: a small, convex-depressed, clay colored pileus; an large, pallid, a non-marginate lamellae; a clay colored, viscid (not thickly gelatinous) stipe; entirely luminescent basidiomes; broadly ellipsoid basidiospores; cylindrical, a non-gelatinous subhymenium; an ixocutis pileipellis with diverticulate terminal cells that may represent a separable pellicle; and a weakly gelatinized hyphae.

In addition, M. luxperpetua forms small basidiomes (pileus 2Â–5.5 mm diam; stipe 4Â–8 Ã— 0.3Â–0.7 mm), small lamellar edges that lack orange resinous exudates, a yellow stipe that is merely viscid (not glutinous), broader basidiospores with mean 7.6 Ã— 4.7 Âµm (Qm = 1.8), and a differentiated hypodermium.

Mycena luxperpetua feed off and decompose organic matter as a source of nutrients to sustain their growth.

Bioluminescence
Like many other organisms in which it occurs, bioluminescence in fungi is an oxygen-dependent reaction involving a substrate called luciferans, which is catalyzed by another enzyme called luciferases. During thisluciferan-luciferase reaction, unstable chemical intermediates are produced which create a bioluminescent appearence. As these substrates begin to decompose, excess energy is released as light emission, causing the tissues in the fungal cells to glow or luminesce. The intensity level and location of the luminescence differs between the species in this genus.

Evolutionary Implications
What is interesting about Mycena luxperpetua is the variety of glowing mushrooms found across the the entire Mycena genus. The luminescent trait in mushrooms is believed to originate from 16 different Mycena lineages; because not all Mycena species bioluminesce, scientists suggest that luminescence evolved at a single point in Mycena's evolutionary history - and that later some of the species in the genus eventually lost the ability to glow. Scientists further suggesst that bioluminescence within the basidiomycetes has evolved independently in a least three distinct lineages.

Role of luminescence in Fungi
Fungal luminescence has been hypothesized to attract invertebrates that aid in spore dispersal, which may be a suitable explanation for those species with luminescent basidiomes, but not for those in which only the mycelium emits light. Additional hypotheses include the attraction of predators of mycetophagous invertebrates, and even the function of emitted light as a warning to nocturnal heterotrophs that might consume the fungus or its substrate, similar to warning colorations observed in other organisms. In a study by Sivinski, leaves and twigs covered with a luminescent mycelia, as well as glowing basidiomes, were placed in sealed glass vials coated with a sticky substance, and used to trap arthropods at night. When compared with control tubes containing basidiomes that had been rendered non-luminescent by soaking in alcohol, significantly more Collembola and Diptera species were attracted to the tubes with bioluminescent material, lending support for such hypotheses.

It is also possible that bioluminescence in these fungi is nothing more than the by-product of some other metabolic process. Because the reaction is oxygen-dependent, it has been suggested that bioluminescence may have evolved as a method for fungi to consume excess oxygen during other metabolic processes (i.e., an antioxidant). Because of this species' relatively recent discovery, scientists are still trying to uncover any potential medical implications of Mycena luxperpetua.