According to SCITECHDAILY

A New Link Between Fungi and Weather Formation

Scientists are exploring an unexpected idea with potentially wide-reaching implications: fungi may influence weather by helping ice form inside clouds. According to the report, an international research team including scientists from Virginia Tech identified fungal proteins capable of triggering ice formation at relatively warm subzero temperatures. This finding suggests that fungi may play a more active role in atmospheric processes than previously understood and could eventually contribute to new approaches in cloud seeding, freezing technologies, and climate science.

How Ice Formation Shapes Rainfall

The article explains that cloud seeding depends on particles known as ice nucleators. These particles encourage supercooled water droplets in clouds to freeze into ice crystals. As the crystals attract more water, they become larger and heavier until they fall. During descent, they may melt into rain before reaching the ground. Because ice formation is a key step in this chain of events, any biological material capable of initiating freezing may influence how precipitation develops.

Why Fungal Proteins Matter

The newly identified fungal proteins stand out because they can trigger ice formation at relatively warm subzero temperatures. This property makes them significant in atmospheric science, where the exact temperature at which freezing begins can affect cloud structure and precipitation dynamics. Researchers suggest that these fungal proteins may one day offer a safer alternative to conventional cloud-seeding materials. The article notes that silver iodide, the most widely used material in cloud seeding, is effective but highly toxic, while fungal proteins may offer a less hazardous option.

A Potential Safer Alternative to Silver Iodide

One of the report’s clearest practical implications concerns weather modification. If fungal proteins can be produced in sufficient quantities, researchers believe they could potentially replace toxic ice-nucleating compounds currently used in cloud seeding. The article quotes researcher Boris Vinatzer saying that if enough of the protein could be cheaply produced, it might make cloud seeding much safer. This does not mean fungi are ready to be used operationally in weather engineering today, but it does indicate that the discovery could shift future research toward more biologically derived materials.

Scientists Traced the Gene to an Unusual Origin

The study also identified an evolutionary detail that makes the discovery even more unusual. Researchers found evidence suggesting that the fungal gene responsible for the ice-nucleating protein likely originated in bacteria and was acquired by a fungal ancestor through horizontal gene transfer. According to the report, this transfer may have happened hundreds of thousands, or even millions, of years ago. Scientists describe gene transfer from bacteria to fungi as possible but uncommon, which makes the origin of this fungal trait particularly notable.

Advances in Genomics Made the Discovery Possible

Although scientists have known since the early 1990s that fungi can trigger ice formation, the report explains that only recent progress in DNA sequencing and computational analysis made it possible to identify the exact gene involved. Researchers examined fungi in the Mortierellaceae family and were able to pinpoint the genetic basis of the protein responsible for ice nucleation. This marks a shift from observing a biological effect to understanding its molecular mechanism, an important step for any future application.

The Biological Role in Fungi Is Still Unclear

Even with the discovery of the gene, scientists do not yet fully understand why fungi use it. The report says the exact benefit of the protein for fungi remains uncertain. However, researchers observed that the gene appears to have become more refined over time, suggesting it has been shaped by evolutionary pressure and may provide some biological advantage. That improvement may also increase its usefulness for scientific and industrial applications.

Cell-Free and Water-Soluble Properties Increase Its Appeal

The fungal proteins differ from bacterial ice nucleators in ways that make them especially attractive for applied use. The report says fungal ice-nucleating proteins are cell-free and water-soluble. These characteristics are important because they make the material easier to isolate and potentially safer to use in controlled settings. In contrast, bacterial approaches often rely on whole cells, which introduce more biological complexity and potential contamination concerns. Researchers present this difference as one of the main reasons fungal proteins may be especially promising.

Frozen Food Production Could Benefit

Beyond weather-related uses, the article points to applications in food technology. In frozen food production, fungal proteins may provide a safer and more defined additive because the fungus naturally releases the ice-nucleating molecule and the final material can be separated from the rest of the organism. Researchers suggest that this could allow the development of a controlled additive to assist in the preparation of frozen foods without introducing whole bacterial cells into the process.

Cryopreservation Is Another Promising Area

The report also highlights cryopreservation as a potential application. Biological materials such as tissues, sperm, eggs, and embryos are vulnerable to damage during freezing. Researchers say a fungal ice nucleator could help water freeze earlier around cells, before temperatures drop too low, which may better protect delicate biological structures. This possible use is important because it extends the discovery from environmental science into medicine, reproductive biology, and biotechnology.

Climate Models May Improve With Better Data

The article makes clear that the significance of fungal ice nucleation is not limited to direct applications. Ice formation in clouds also matters for climate modeling because it affects how clouds interact with radiation. The report explains that climate models estimate how much radiation clouds reflect into space and how much reaches Earth’s surface, and the presence of ice changes those calculations. Now that scientists know the fungal molecule involved, they may be able to better estimate how much of it exists in clouds, which could eventually improve the accuracy of climate models.

A Small Molecule With Big Scientific Implications

What makes the story especially compelling is the scale mismatch. The molecule itself is small, but the systems it may influence are enormous. A fungal protein produced by microscopic organisms could affect freezing in clouds, help guide precipitation research, improve food processing, and support delicate biological preservation. The report does not claim that fungi directly “control” the weather in a simple or deterministic sense. Rather, it presents evidence that fungal molecules may participate in one of the crucial microphysical processes that shape weather events. That distinction matters: the finding expands the scientific picture of atmospheric chemistry and biology without overstating it.

The Research Adds to a Growing View of Atmospheric Biology

This work fits into a broader scientific trend recognizing that biological particles, not just mineral dust or industrial aerosols, can affect atmospheric processes. Fungi, bacteria, and other microorganisms have increasingly been studied for their ability to act as ice nucleators, and this report pushes that understanding further by identifying a specific fungal protein class involved. In that sense, the discovery helps connect microbiology, atmospheric science, and climate research into a single framework.

A Discovery With Practical and Scientific Value

Overall, the report presents the discovery as both scientifically surprising and practically promising. It links fungal evolution, bacterial gene transfer, cloud physics, food technology, cryopreservation, and climate modeling in one line of research. The findings do not show that fungi can intentionally direct weather, but they do support the idea that fungal molecules may help shape the physical conditions that lead to rain and ice formation. In modern science, that is often how major insights begin: not with grand control, but with the recognition that the smallest actors in nature may be doing far more than anyone first assumed.

References

Eufemio RJ, et al. 2026. A previously unrecognized class of fungal ice-nucleating proteins with bacterial ancestry. Science Advances.

Virginia Tech News. Fantastic fungi found with ability to freeze water. March 11, 2026.

According to SCITECHDAILY