Single Celled Slime Mold Saves Memories Without The Nervous System
Germany, Mar 4: Memories of past events enable us to make smarter decisions for the future. This is possible because of our brain and the nervous system. But a single celled organism, slime mold (Physarum polycephalum – a protozoa) can store memories even though it lacks a nervous system. Researchers in Germany discovered that in the process of gathering and consuming food, the slime mold stores memories of food gathering experiences and uses for locating food in future. Slime molds have a tubular network of thick and thin tubes which are interconnected.
When the slime mold senses food, tubes near the food dilate and tubes farther from the food shrink and it creeps in the direction of the dilated tubes until it engulfs the food. But even after that it holds the cluster of tubes leaving an imprint of where the food was once located. This helps it move in that direction in the future if food is near it.
The imprinted memory of food location helps in finding the way to food. Just like the human brain it can store memories of the network and the memories are rewritten when it hunts for new nutrients. It can restructure its tubes to form new networks based on every encounter with the food.
Oh that’s amazing