Finding fungus - wherever it grows.

Byline: Abigail Tucker

Aug. 30--The mycologists are merry. The sun is shining, and they've snagged the van from the roundworm lab downstairs. Behind them lie the fortresslike walls of Beltsville's U.S. National Fungus Collections; ahead, the open road, winding toward Catoctin Mountain in Western Maryland, and acre upon acre of rust fungus. The leader of this collecting trip is Cathie Aime; she's the one at the wheel. For someone who creeps through forests as slowly as slime mold (mushroom-hunting in the jungles of Guyana, she covers just 50 square meters a day), the woman drives like a demon. And she keeps turning around to discuss the phylogeny of rust -- a kind of evolutionary family tree, which the scientists are working on today, tomorrow and possibly forever. "I will not finish in my lifetime," Aime says, swerving around a Civic. In the back seat, the "rust slaves" are wondering how long the lifetime of anyone in the van will actually be. The slaves (that's their field name; the more scientific term would be two lab technicians and a post-doctoral student) shoot anxious glances at the weaving road. But as Aime details the plight of fungi scholarship, they seem to forget their own peril, heads bobbing in agreement as she explains that there are an estimated ...