mycelium

The mass of hyphae making up a colony of fungi. [G. mykes, fungus, + helos, nail, wart, excrescence on animal or plant]

- aerial m. the portion of m. that grows upward or outward from the surface of the substrate, and from which propagative spores develop in or on characteristic structures that are distinctive for various generic groups.

- nonseptate m. one in which there are no septa, or “cross-walls,” in the hyphae; inasmuch as the latter are not divided into numerous individual cells, the multinucleated protoplasm may flow throughout the tubelike structures.

- septate m. one in which septa, or “cross-walls,” divide the hyphae into numerous uninucleated or multinucleated cells.

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my·ce·li·um mī-'sē-lē-əm n, pl -lia -lē-ə the mass of interwoven filamentous hyphae that forms esp. the vegetative body of a fungus and is often submerged in another body (as of soil or organic matter or the tissues of a host) also a similar mass of filaments formed by some bacteria (as of the genus Streptomyces)

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n. (pl. mycelia)

the tangled mass of fine branching threads that make up the feeding and growing part of a fungus.

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my·ce·li·um (mi-seґle-əm) pl. myceґlia [myc- + Gr. hēlos nail] the mass of threadlike processes (hyphae) constituting the fungal thallus. mycelial, mycelian adj