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This is corn smut, a culinary valuable type of fungus. It starts life like a yeast sporidia by budding daughter cells until it finds a genetically suitable mating partner. Once it becomes dikaryotic it starts to form the fungal hypha and infects a single kernel forming what you see as a gall.

While deletirious, and often considered a blight by farmers, the immature galls can be sold for many times more than the corn if it had not been infected. They are called huitlacoche when being used as culinary, and are described as tasting sweet and savory with earthy tones.

When infecting the kernel, the corn tries to protect itself using a reactive oxygen species, that in turn is countered by the fungus's YAP1 gene that protects it from oxidative stress. Genetic research into M. Maydis has actually worked tangible results in our ongoing fight against breast cancer!

M. Maydis is a basidiomycota or "club type" fungus, which is to say it belongs to the same order as the classic mushrooms you're used to seeing such as fly aminita/agaric which is the inspiration for the Super Mario power up mushroom.

This fungus is also considered a model species as in it's sporidia phase is capable of accepting gene modification.

M. Maydis is also capable of synthesizing the essential amino acid lysine, which we need but cannot produce ourselves.

So, you see, not all corn infecting funguses are bad. Some are actually really cool, and have funny names like "smut".

Had to fix the self censorship bs

These people still don't care for the First Amendment.

cross-posted from: https://ibbit.at/post/128511

From BBC News via this RSS feed

GANGSTERS FROM MS-13, a Trump-designated Foreign Terrorist Organization, intimidated Hondurans not to vote for the left-leaning presidential candidate, 10 eyewitness sources told The Intercept, in most cases urging them to instead cast their ballots in last Sunday’s election for the right-wing National Party candidate — the same candidate endorsed by U.S. President Donald Trump.

Ten residents from four working-class neighborhoods controlled by MS-13, including volunteer election workers and local journalists, told The Intercept they saw firsthand gang members giving residents an ultimatum to vote for the Trump-endorsed conservative candidate or face consequences. Six other sources with knowledge of the intimidation — including government officials, human rights investigators, and people with direct personal contact with gangs — corroborated their testimony. Gang members drove voters to the polls in MS-13-controlled mototaxi businesses, three sources said, and threatened to kill street-level activists for the left-leaning Liberty and Refoundation, or LIBRE, party if they were seen bringing supporters to the polls. Two witnesses told The Intercept they saw members of MS-13 checking people’s ballots inside polling sites, as did a caller to the national emergency help line.

Do they have any rule that says you need a minimum number of users on a site to fall under the law?

If servers of someinstance.co.au fine if they move to hosting in Finland?

It just feels like a nightmare.

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“Well, hey … these things just snap right off.”

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Four Afghan men were ordered to report to the Taliban government's department of vice and virtue for dressing in costumes inspired by the TV series Peaky Blinders.

The friends were told that their clothing was "in conflict with Afghan and Islamic values", a Taliban spokesman told the BBC, adding the values in Peaky Blinders went against Afghan culture.

In videos posted online, the men, who have been released, can be seen posing in flat caps and three-piece suits similar to those worn in the series set in England soon after World War One.

In an interview with YouTube channel Herat-Mic uploaded at the end of November, before they were summoned, the friends said they admired the fashion displayed in the series, adding that they had received positive reactions from locals.

From https://ohioline.osu.edu/factsheet/anr-0139

Don't judge my dinner lol. It was a long day and I wanted something quick and easy. Defrosted the chops, got them ready to coat, and, what's this? No bags? Surely this must be a manufacturing anomaly.

Nope. I go back into the pantry and grab the newer box, open it, and....also no bags.

Had to waste one of the good, gallon-size Ziplocs for this.

How many fractions of a penny did they save (and not pass on to me) by not including the shake bags? Ugh!

cross-posted from: https://piefed.blahaj.zone/c/onehundredninetysix/p/453245/wow-pretty-rule

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“Same as the others, O’Neill. The flippers, the fishbowl, the frog, the lights, the armor. ... Just one question remains: Is this the work of our guy, or a copycat?”

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