Anthology containing the story "Green Mold"(?) where green mold grows on everything and eventually the astronauts

Question

Back in high school in the late 1970s I had a book of short stories we had to read in English class, and one story has stayed with me every since. It was a sci-fi story that was called, I think, "Green Mold", about a space ship that landed on Mars that was slowly being consumed by a form of green mold that was growing on the surfaces of everything and, eventually, the astronauts themselves.

The green mold or fungus starts growing on the outside of the ship and compromising the skin of the spacecraft. It spreads to the inside of the ship when brought in on the boots of the explorers, tiny green specks that are a form of intelligent life itself. When the equipment starts failing they discover it has spread behind the instrument panels, starting with the softer wiring and rubber insulation and soon spreading to the metal itself. As a result all of their instruments no longer work. Eventually, the structure of the ship becomes unsound and the crew has to evacuate to the surface of the planet and find shelter with no means of leaving, no way to contact anyone, and limited supplies to keep them alive. Eventually the story ends when they discover one day that the mold has now begun growing on themselves and they will eventually disappear with no trace in a slow, painful way. It certainly doesn't end on a happy note, and seems to be science fiction horror.

I think the author may have been Russian, but I don't know if it was written in the 50s, 60s, or 70s. Some of the other stories in the book might have been written by Russian authors, but I don't know if that applies to this story or not.

Answer 1

As JRE has commented this sounds very similar to Foundation and Earth (1986) by Isaac Asimov. Although the time frame is a bit too new and this is a novel rather than a short story. However, the book is split in to sections/parts so maybe that's why you thought it was an anthology if this is indeed correct.

Part V: Melpomenia

The crew now visit Melpomenia, the third and final Spacer coordinate they have, where the atmosphere has become reduced to a few thousandths of normal atmospheric pressure. Wearing space suits, they enter a library, and find a plaque listing the names and coordinates of all fifty Spacer worlds. On the way back to the ship, they notice a moss has begun to grow around the seals of their space suits, and just in time, surmise that the moss is feeding on minuscule leakages of carbon dioxide. Thus, they are able to eradicate the moss with a blaster and heavy UV-illumination so that no spores are unintentionally carried off the planet. They then plot the Spacer worlds on the ship's map, which form a rough sphere and conclude that the location of Earth must be near to the center of the sphere. This area turns out to have a binary star system.

_{Wikipedia, Foundation and Earth}

Answer 2

I wonder whether this might be "Creatures of Green Slime" originally published in Super-Science Fiction, June 1959. The author is allegedly "James Rosenquest", but this is possibly a pseudonym for Robert Silverberg. Details are scanty, and this issue is missing from the Luminist archives, but a review notes that:

"Creatures of Green Slime" by James Rosenquest is about the first manned expedition to Mars, in which an encounter with an alien life form results in takeover by green slime. It's an attempt to create horror in the reader with the use of italics, exclamation points, and strong men weeping. Doesn't work. What stopped me in my tracks, though was the fact that they check out the green slime by testing it on a bowl of goldfish. Yes, that's right. They took a bowl of goldfish on the first manned expedition to Mars. I wouldn't have thought to take it, but by golly someone did.