Myxo my cet ace a (miksomiseta see)

pl. [ NL., Myxomycetes (mik"sō-mi-sētēz), n. pl. [NL., room, fungus.] A group of fungus-like organisms, the slime-molds or slime-fungi, belonging, according to the cla ification of De Bary, to the Mycetozoa, and numbering about 300 species. They form slimy yellow, brown, or purple (never green) ma es of motile protoplasm during the period of active growth, and are then destitute of cell wall and nucleus. Under certain conditions they secrete a cellulose wall and pa into a resting state. This resting state is brought about either by the absence of the requisite moisture, producing larger, somewhat irregular ma es, the so-called sclerotium stage, or when the plasmodium seems to have concluded its vegetative period, the protoplasm then becoming heaped into a ma which breaks up internally into a large number of rounded bodies, the spores, each one of which is provided with a cell wall. Under proper conditions these spores burst their walls and become motile nucleated ma es of protoplasm (swarm-spores) which divide separately by simple fi ion. After a few days two or more of these swarm-spores coalesce and form new plasmodia, which differ only in size from the original. They occur on decaying logs, tan-bark, decaying mo es, etc. See Mycetozoa. myxomycetous (mikso-mi-sētus), a. [ mycetes. myxont (mik's on), n. [ A