• Question: What is the largest biological process?

    Asked by meg123 to Amy, Karen, Sarah, Vijay, Will on 19 Jun 2012.
    • Photo: Sarah Martin

      Sarah Martin answered on 19 Jun 2012:

      Hi meg,

      Great follow-up question! Hm, I guess that would have to be something like blue whales giving Birth – that strikes me as quite a large biological process!

      The Great Barrier Reef is an even larger biological process – it’s the world’s largest structure composed of living entities, stretching 2,000 km, and contains many organisms of lots of different species!

      The largest organism however is probably a honey fungus of the species Armillaria ostoyae, a mushroom that lives in the Malheur National Forest in the Blue Mountains of eastern Oregon, U.S.A.. It was found to be the largest fungal colony in the world, and spans 8.9 km² (2,200 acres) of area! It’s about 2400 years old!

      🙂 Sarah

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