The Wayback Machine - https://web.archive.org/web/20131212220948/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/1402533.stm
BBC Homepage World Service Education
BBC Homepagelow graphics version | feedback | help
BBC News Online
 You are in: Sci/Tech
Front Page 
World 
UK 
UK Politics 
Business 
Sci/Tech 
Health 
Education 
Entertainment 
Talking Point 
In Depth 
AudioVideo 



Javier Garcia-Guinea
It appears to be a unique phenomenon
 real 28k

Marc Valls
The public should not be afraid
 real 28k

Friday, 22 June, 2001, 13:13 GMT 14:13 UK
Fungus 'eats' CDs
Compact disc
Could your CD collection be at risk?
Scientists in Spain have identified a new form of fungus that eats compact discs.

A geologist at the Museum of Natural History in Madrid discovered the fungus, which belongs to the common Geotrichum family, on CDs brought back from the central American state of Belize.


Even though this fungus widespread it could only develop on a CD in high humidity and high temperature, which is not the case most of the time

Marc Valls, National Centre for Biotechnology, Spain
The fungus had attacked the outer edge of the disc, consuming plastic and even aluminium. It rendered the CD unplayable.

Experts say it is unusual but not unknown for a fungus to attack manmade substances like plastics.

Javier Garcia-Guinea, head of Geology at the museum, said he believed it was the first documented case of a fungus attacking CDs.

Similar reports were coming in from around the world, he said.

"This year we received many e-mails from Panama, Costa Rica and Guatemala describing similar cases in tropical countries," Dr Garcia-Guinea told the BBC.

Fungus 'widespread'

Marc Valls, a biologist at Spain's National Centre for Biotechnology, warned people not to be alarmed. He said the fungus would only attack CDs under certain conditions.

"Even though this fungus is widespread it could only develop on a CD in high humidity and high temperature, which is not the case most of the time," Mr Valls told the BBC.

And he said there was a positive side to the story - the ability of micro-organisms to degrade manmade products could help in waste disposal.

"Nature is very clever and, for all the materials that we design, sooner or later they will be degraded by some organism."

Search BBC News Online

Advanced search options
Launch console
BBC RADIO NEWS
BBC ONE TV NEWS
WORLD NEWS SUMMARY
PROGRAMMES GUIDE
See also:

07 Aug 00 | Sci/Tech
Fantastic fungus find
Links to more Sci/Tech stories are at the foot of the page.


E-mail this story to a friend

Links to more Sci/Tech stories