FIG. 8.

Effect of vacuole organization and hyphal branching architecture on diffusive efficiency. (A) One thousand Monte Carlo simulations gave mean values of α (equation 1) for 400-μm lengths of vacuole strings either continuously connected by one tube (single tubes) or connected by a random number of tubes in the range of one to three vacuoles (multiple tubes). (B) γ values (equation 2) for 400-μm lengths of hyphae containing one (LV), two (SV), or four (MV) independent vacuolar strings (mean values from 1,000 Monte Carlo simulations). The β value for the tubular vacuolar region is shown for comparison (see text). (C) Values for γ of different branching structures are shown (ν) as well as the values indicating the maximum tip nitrogen content that can be supported by diffusion in the structure to tips growing at their maximum rate (% N in tip).