Coloured scanning electron micrograph (SEM) of Acremonium stromaticum, a hyaline hyphomycete (glassy, lightly pigmented conidial fungus) that occurs widely in nature but is also encountered as a contaminant. Asexual reproduction is by conidiophores that produce conidia (phialoconidia or ameroconidia) at hyphal branches. A. stromaticum is one of the causative agents of eumycotic white grain mycetoma. It is also one of five fungi present in most banana root and rhizome lesions in many parts of the tropics. A. stromaticum is known to cause opportunistic infections (hyalohyphomycosis) in immunocompromised patients, including arthritis, osteoarthritis, peritonitis, endocarditis, pneumonia, cerebritis and subcutaneous infection. Magnification: x1, 200 when shortest axis printed at 25 millimetres. |