bio

Common mycorrhizal network (CMN)

When a single fungal individual taps into the roots of two or more plants at once, it stitches them into a shared web — a common mycorrhizal network. This is the leap from "each tree has its own fungal partners" to "fungi link multiple trees," and it is the heart of the wood-wide web hypothesis: once two trees plug into one fungal body, material (carbon, minerals, water) can in principle move from one to the other. That the network exists is well-supported; that it coordinates a forest is contested.