for polyketide synthases and ABC transporters. The genome is

rich in complex repeats, one class of which is clustered and

may serve as centromeres. Partial copies of the extrachromo-

somal ribosomal DNA (r DNA) element are found at the ends of

each chromosome, suggesting a novel telomere structure and

use of a common mechanism to maintain both the rDNA and

chromosomal termini. A proteonome-based phylogeny shows

that the amoebozoa diverged from the animal-fungal lineage

after the plant-animal split, but Dictyostelium seems to have

retained more of the diversity of the ancestral genome than

have plants, animals or fungi.’’

r e f e r e n c e s

Butterfield NJ, 2005. Probable Proterozoic fungi. Paleobiology 31:165–182.

Eichinger L, et al., 2005. The genome of the social amoeba Dic-tyostelium discoideum. Nature 435: 43–57.

Hijri M, Sanders IR, 2005. Low gene copy number shows that ar-buscular mycorrhizal fungi inherit genetically different nuclei.Nature 433: 160–163.

Maguire KL, 2005. Touchy feely fungi. Biologist 52: 206–210.

doi:10.1016/j.mycol.2005.11.011

The Mycological Society of Japan and the BMS join forces

2006 will see the 50th Anniversary Annual Meeting of the

Mycological Society of Japan (MSJ). As part of the celebration

of this significant event the MSJ and the BMS will be holding

a joint Symposium at the MSJ’s Annual Meeting on the 3rd

and 4th June 2006, and this will be held in Chiba, Japan. The

Symposium will be jointly funded by the MSJ and BMS and

will consist of a plenary lecture given by Prof. Geoff Gadd

(BMS President) and six presentations from young mycolo-

gists, of which three will be members of the BMS and three

members of the MSJ. Selection of the young mycologists repre-

senting the BMS was made by members of the BMS Council at

our recent Annual Scientific Meeting in Manchester. To be el-

igible for selection, the candidates needed to be at the post-

graduate or postdoctoral level and lacking a permanent

position. Choosing who should receive these highly presti-

gious awards proved very difficult because of the extremely

high standard and quality of the talks/posters presented. After

much consideration the following candidates were selected:

(1) Graham Wright (University of Edinburgh) who presented

a talk on ‘Manipulating fungi with light’ and who won the

Howard Eggins Prize for the best lecture by a young scientist

at the meeting; Andrew Bowen (University of Dundee) who

presented a talk on the ‘Colonisation and invasion of porous

matrices by filamentous fungi’; and Emilie Combet (Warwick

Horticultural Research International) who presented a poster

on the ‘Origin and role of fungal flavour volatiles’. These out-

standing mycologists, as young ambassadors of the BMS, will

be provided with financial support to travel to and attend the

meeting in Japan. They will also each contribute a paper of their

talk for inclusion in a Special Issue of Mycoscience, the official

English journal of the MSJ. Besides Prof. Gadd, Prof. Neil Gow

(a former President of the BMS) will also present a plenary

lecture at the meeting. For further information about this

meeting visit the following webpage: http://wwwsoc.nii.ac.jp/

msj7/english/index_html. Alternatively contact the confer-

ence secretary Kiminori Shimizu by email at kshimizu@faculty.

chiba-u.jp.

Nick D. READ

doi:10.1016/j.mycol.2005.11.008

Mycological Dispatches 35