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Slime Molds Can Remember Things Without a Brain

A picture taken on October 16, 2019 at the Parc Zoologique de Paris shows a Physarum Polycephalum better known as a “Blob.”STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN | AFP | Getty Images
A picture taken on October 16, 2019 at the Parc Zoologique de Paris shows a Physarum Polycephalum better known as a “Blob.”STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN | AFP | Getty Images
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Slime Molds Can Remember Things Without a Brain

A picture taken on October 16, 2019 at the Parc Zoologique de Paris shows a Physarum Polycephalum better known as a “Blob.”STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN | AFP | Getty Images
A picture taken on October 16, 2019 at the Parc Zoologique de Paris shows a Physarum Polycephalum better known as a “Blob.”STEPHANE DE SAKUTIN | AFP | Getty Images

A recent German study found that the slime mold - known as Physarum polycephalum or The Blob - seems to remember where it previously found sources of food even without a brain or nervous system.

P. polycephalum is one of the most peculiar forms of life on earth. It is not plant, animal, nor fungus, but a species of slime mold which lives in dark forests and enjoys damp and cool environments.

The creature wanders over dead plants with a significant speed eating all fungi, bacteria, and decomposed materials it may find in its way.

Early in its life cycle, P. polycephalum exists as a single cell with a single nucleus, but later it merges with other cells to form a huge single cell that looks like a yellow pool of mud.

Similar to the invincible creatures featured in The Blob thriller, P. polycephalum can reassemble its parts even after being ripped in pieces.

In 2000, Japanese researcher Toshiyuki Nakagaki discovered that P. polycephalum was capable of solving a simple maze to reach a food source.

Biological physicists Mirna Kramar and Karen Alim of the Max Planck Institute in Germany have discovered that this brainless, neuronless creature uses the very architecture of its body to store memories about where it has previously found food.

The body of this creature is composed of a complicated network of connected tubes. During a study that will be published on March 9, in the PNAS journal, the biological physicists found that when P. polycephalum discovers a source of food, it releases a chemical that locally softens the tube wall at the site of the food.

This then triggers the tubes to dilate, becoming wider, to expedite flow within the slime mold to the site. When it found and eaten a nutritious meal, those thick tubes remain in place so that it can quickly return to the site if food were to reappear.

P. polycephalum can reabsorb parts of its body if it stretches out exploratory tubes into a region that is inhospitable, or contains nothing of interest.

"This is not utterly dissimilar to how the human brain works. In this case, synapses, which send information between neurons, strengthen when we learn and grow stronger the more we use them, but can grow weaker if we don't - vaguely similar to the slime mold's tubes, which will grow thicker at sites of interest, but will die off or be reabsorbed if their presence is no longer useful to the organism," said researcher Karen Alim in a report published on March 1, on the Science Alert website.

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Varieties

Monsters and Memes: Labubu Dolls Ride China Soft-power Wave

Labubu dolls on display at the Pop Land theme park in Beijing. Pedro PARDO / AFP
Labubu dolls on display at the Pop Land theme park in Beijing. Pedro PARDO / AFP
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Monsters and Memes: Labubu Dolls Ride China Soft-power Wave

Labubu dolls on display at the Pop Land theme park in Beijing. Pedro PARDO / AFP
Labubu dolls on display at the Pop Land theme park in Beijing. Pedro PARDO / AFP

Small, fuzzy and baring sharp teeth, Chinese toymaker Pop Mart's Labubu monster dolls have taken over the world, drawing excited crowds at international stores and adorning the handbags of celebrities such as Rihanna and Cher.

Beijing-based Pop Mart is part of a rising tide of Chinese cultural exports gaining traction abroad, furry ambassadors of a "cool" China even in places associated more with negative public opinion of Beijing such as Europe and North America, said AFP.

Labubus, which typically sell for around $40, are released in limited quantities and sold in "blind boxes", meaning buyers don't know the exact model they will receive.

The dolls are "a bit quirky and ugly and very inclusive, so people can relate", interior designer Lucy Shitova told AFP at a Pop Mart store in London, where in-person sales of Labubus have been suspended over fears that fans could turn violent in their quest for the toys.

"Now everything goes viral... because of social media. And yes, it's cool. It's different."

While neighboring East Asian countries South Korea and Japan are globally recognized for their high-end fashion, cinema and pop songs, China's heavily censored film and music industry have struggled to attract international audiences, and the country's best-known clothing exporter is fast-fashion website Shein.

There have been few success stories of Chinese companies selling upmarket goods under their own brands, faced with stereotypes of cheap and low-quality products.

"It has been hard for the world's consumers to perceive China as a brand-creating nation," the University of Maryland's Fan Yang told AFP.

Pop Mart has bucked the trend, spawning copycats dubbed by social media users as "lafufus" and detailed YouTube videos on how to verify a doll's authenticity.

Brands such as designer womenswear label Shushu/Tong, Shanghai-based Marchen and Beijing-based handbag maker Songmont have also gained recognition abroad over the past few years.

"It might just be a matter of time before even more Chinese brands become globally recognizable," Yang said.

TikTok effect

Through viral exports like Labubu, China is "undergoing a soft-power shift where its products and image are increasingly cool among young Westerners," said Allison Malmsten, an analyst at China-based Daxue Consulting.

Malmsten said she believed social media could boost China's global image "similar to that of Japan in the 80s to 2010s with Pokemon and Nintendo".

Video app TikTok -- designed by China's ByteDance -- paved the way for Labubu's ascent when it became the first Chinese-branded product to be indispensable for young people internationally.

Joshua Kurlantzick from the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) told AFP that "TikTok probably played a role in changing consumers' minds about China".

TikTok, which is officially blocked within China but still accessible with VPN software, has over one billion users, including what the company says is nearly half of the US population.

The app has become a focus of national security fears in the United States, with a proposed ban seeing American TikTok users flock to another Chinese app, Rednote, where they were welcomed as digital "refugees".

A conduit for Chinese social media memes and fashion trends, TikTok hosts over 1.7 million videos about Labubu.

Labubumania

Cultural exports can "improve the image of China as a place that has companies that can produce globally attractive goods or services", CFR's Kurlantzick told AFP.

"I don't know how much, if at all, this impacts images of China's state or government," he said, pointing to how South Korea's undeniable soft power has not translated into similar levels of political might.

While plush toys alone might not translate into actual power, the United States' chaotic global image under the Trump presidency could benefit perceptions of China, the University of Maryland's Yang said.

"The connection many make between the seeming decline of US soft power and the potential rise in China's global image may reflect how deeply intertwined the two countries are in the minds of people whose lives are impacted by both simultaneously," she told AFP.

At the very least, Labubu's charms appear to be promoting interest in China among the younger generation.

"It's like a virus. Everyone just wants it," Kazakhstani mother-of-three Anelya Batalova told AFP at Pop Mart's theme park in Beijing.