PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - , TI - A Hair & a Fungus AID - 10.1525/abt.2013.75.5.7 DP - 2013 May 01 TA - The American Biology Teacher PG - 336--339 VI - 75 IP - 5 4099 - http://abt.ucpress.edu/content/75/5/336.short 4100 - http://abt.ucpress.edu/content/75/5/336.full AB - A simple method is presented to show kids the size of a microbe – a fungus hypha – compared to a human hair. Common household items are used to make sterile medium on a stove or hotplate, which is dispensed in the cells of a weekly plastic pill box. Mold fungi can be easily and safely grown on the medium from the classroom environment. A microscope capable of 200–400× is necessary. Students can use a hair from their own head to view a fungus and a hair side-by-side on the same slide. They will see that a microscopic fungus hypha is 20–50× smaller in diameter than a hair. Older students will also learn that microbes are measured in micrometers, that fungi are ubiquitous, and that decay is an inevitable part of Earth’s processes.