The fungus is part of a family of mushrooms called ophiocordyceps, with The Last of Us imagining a mutated strain that uses humans as hosts. Ants infected ophiocordyceps die moments before a large ...

In the real world, ants usually come into contact with this fungus when spores – pollen-size reproductive particles that the fungus makes – fall onto the ant from a tree or plant overhead.

Here the authors show that an ant’s individual immune pathways provide specialized protection against bacterial but not fungal infections, while social immunity protects against pathogenic fungi ...

“We found that infected ants first lose their daily rhythms,” said ... batch of fungus to determine which genes it switches on during infection. In addition to collecting these fungal samples, Kasson ...

A coral-fungus-farming worker of the fungus-farming ant species Apterostigma collare, collected at La Selva Biological Station in Costa Rica in 2015, on its fungus garden. Credit: Alex ...

mushrooms and zombifying fungi. Don't worry – these "brain-eating organisms" tend to target insects. In the real world, ants usually comes into contact with this fungus when spores – pollen-size ...

Insect body snatchers One of the most famous examples is the zombie ant fungus ... “The Last of Us,” in which a widespread fungal infection turns people into zombie-like creatures and causes ...

Credit: David R. Nash A new study finds that attine ants developed structural adaptations to host bacteria, specifically Pseudonocardia, which aids their fungal farming. A study explores the evolution ...