Re: [AV Media Matters] news story about CD & fungus

[seubert@library.ucsb.edu]

>The fungus had burrowed into the CD from the outer
>edge, then devoured the thin aluminium layer and some of the data-storing
>polycarbonate resin. Dr Cardenes said: ?It completely destroys the
>aluminium. It leaves nothing behind.? Biologists at the council had never
>seen this fungus, but concluded that it belonged to a common genus called
>geotrichum.

Since when do fungi eat aluminum? I learned in school that fungi (and
everything else alive) eat organic matter, not metal. I looked up
geotrichum at www.doctorfungus.org and it says that geotrichum live on
plants, fruits, soil, dairy products, man and mammals. Is this just a
journalist not getting the facts correct and the fungus is actually eating
the polycarbonate?

David

David Seubert, Curator
Performing Arts Collection
Davidson Library Special Collections
University of California
Santa Barbara, CA 93106
805-893-5444 Fax 805-893-5749
mailto:seubert@library.ucsb.edu
http://www.library.ucsb.edu/speccoll/pa/