Relationship between carbohydrate movement and the symbiosis in lichens with green algae.

When isolated in pure culture, four genera of lichen algae were able to produce the polyol which is known to move from the alga to the fungus in lichens with these algae. This conclusion corrects earlier suggestions that the mobile polyol is only formed by the alga in the lichen thallus. Stichococcus produced sorbitol and it is therefore suggested that, in lichens with this alga, sorbitol moves between the symbionts. Hyalococcus and Stichococcus had a similar pattern of incorporation of H(14)CO 3 (-) in the light, suggesting a close relationship between these algae which are only separated now on morphological grounds.The pattern of incorporation of H(14)CO 3 (-) in the light into Cladonia cristatella and its alga (Trebouxia erici) in culture indicates that in the cultured algae more (14)C was incorporated into ethanol insoluble substances and lipids and less into ribitol than in the lichen. The pattern in a joint culture of the alga and the fungus of C. cristatella was approximately intermediate between that of the lichen and the alga. However, only a small amount of (14)C fixed by the alga reached the fungus in the joint culture, and it is therefore suggested that the presence of the fungus without morphological differentiation into a lichen thallus is not sufficient to promote the alga to release carbohydrate.