The Fungus That Thrives on Chernobyl’s Deadliest Radiation
Let me tell you about one of the strangest and most fascinating discoveries to come out of the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone — a place most living things avoid, but where a mysterious black fungus seems to be living its best life.
Nearly four decades after the Chernobyl reactor explosion, the area remains one of the most radioactive places on Earth. Humans can’t safely stay there for long, yet scientists began noticing something surprising on the walls of the ruined reactor itself: dark, velvety mould clinging confidently to surfaces that are still pulsing with ionizing radiation. This fungus, called Cladosporium sphaerospermum , looked like it wasn’t just surviving… it was thriving.
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Back in the late 1990s, microbiologist Nelli Zhdanova walked into the reactor’s abandoned shelter expecting a barren, lifeless environment. Instead, she found entire colonies of fungi — 37 species, many of them black due to high melanin levels. Even more astonishing was the behavior of C. sphaerospermum . It appeared to grow toward radioactive material, almost as if the radiation was something it wanted. Zhdanova called this “radiotropism,” a bizarre parallel to how plants grow toward sunlight.
The puzzle only deepened when researchers showed that the fungus didn’t just tolerate radiation — it grew faster in it. A team led by Ekaterina Dadachova later proposed that its melanin pigment might be doing something extraordinary: converting radiation into chemical energy, somewhat like photosynthesis. This idea was given a sci-fi-sounding name: radiosynthesis. While the mechanism hasn’t yet been proven, experiments revealed that melanin behaves differently under radiation, and the fungus seems to gain some metabolic advantage from the exposure.
What makes this even cooler is that the fungus doesn’t just use melanin as a potential energy converter. It also uses it as a shield. Melanin can absorb and dissipate radiation, protecting the organism’s DNA from damage. Other melanized fungi show similar patterns, though not all display the same growth boost, which suggests that C. sphaerospermum may have evolved a unique adaptation.
The intrigue grew when scientists sent this fungus to the International Space Station. Even in the face of cosmic radiation — far harsher than anything on Earth — the fungus grew more rapidly, and a sensor placed beneath it showed that the fungal layer blocked some of that radiation. It sparked a futuristic idea: if fungi can shield themselves, could they also shield astronauts on missions to the Moon or Mars?
We don’t yet know whether radiosynthesis is real or whether the fungus is reacting to radiation in some other clever way. But what’s clear is that this humble organism has managed to turn one of the most dangerous environments imaginable into a niche where it can flourish. In a place too deadly for humans, life has once again found a way — and in the most unexpected form: a black, radiation-loving mould.
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