Forest-Based Mushrooms and Instrumental Methods of Intensive Production

Dear Colleagues,

Edible fungus is a kind of green food with delicious taste, rich nutrition, and certain medicinal effects. In recent years, edible mushroom cultivation, as established in a number of factory enterprises, is developing rapidly, as it provides a set of economic, ecological, and social benefits and is one of the big projects in the world. However, this still cannot alleviate the scarcity of edible fungi species and the shortage of products. A large number of wild edible fungi resources have not been fully developed and utilized. The fundamental reason is that the nutrition and heredity of edible fungi are quite complex, the cultivation techniques of domestication are not obvious, and the management parameters of cultivation are not clear. The global forest resources are abundant and contains a large number of edible fungi resources that can be exploited and utilized. Therefore, the potential of domesticating and breeding edible forest fungi resources is great. How to breed edible fungus varieties which are popular in the market, easy to be acclimated and commercialized as soon as possible, and how to form a complete set of acclimation – these cultivation techniques and production management standards are urgent problems to be solved.

The nutritional modes of edible fungi are complex and diverse, such as saprophytic Lentinus edodes, parasitic Engleromyces goetzi, facultative saprophytic Armillaria mellea and Russula vinosa belong to ectomycorrhizal fungi. They are very different even though in the same nutritional modes, for example, saprophytic Auricularia heimuer grows on the rotting wood, Coprinus comatus grows on the manure, Agaricus bisporus grows on grass, Morchella sextelata grows on soil. The growth of edible fungi is also closely related to the species of the host, which directly determines the cultivation formula in artificial cultivation, and the environmental conditions in the forest directly determine the environmental conditions in cultivation facility. For the same edible fungus, the content of active ingredients in its fruiting body are also different depending on the habitat in the forest. For example, for Ganoderma lucidum grown in high altitude forests, the content of triterpenoids is much higher than those grown in low altitude forests. Geographical location, climate, and other factors affect the floristic composition of the vegetation in an area, determining the plant communities that occurs. Plant communities are dynamic ecosystems that are constantly changing and affecting the presence of certain types of mushrooms directly. In general, the habitat of wild edible fungi in the forest determines whether they can be grown artificially, and the cultivation mode conditions affects the nutrient content of fruiting bodies.

It is estimated that there are 15000 species of Macrofungi in the world. At present, there are only 7400 species recorded, which is far from meeting the growing needs of people's understanding and utilization of species. Therefore, the field resource investigation of Macrofungi is particularly important. The investigation of field resources can enrich people's understanding of species and develop new available resources, such as Lyophyllum decastes, Clitocybe maxima, and Saarcodon imbricatum, which are popular in the market. Field resource investigation can be used to collect germplasm resources and provide blood and source for the increase of edible fungi. For example, Auricularia auriculata, which has been cultivated for 1400 years, is a white variety collected by scientific researchers from the field in recent years and soon became popular among the public. Another example is Pleurotus salmoneostramineus and P. cornucopiae, which are collected from the field resources. In addition, the investigation of field resources can provide people with some ideas, in order to solve many problems of cultivation technology of edible fungi. As one of the world's four most famous fungi species, Morchella has a high cultivation technology blockage, especially on the requirements of soil matrix, which are not clear. However, in the field resource investigation, it was found that Morchella often grows in large quantities in burned land. Therefore, researchers found that plant ash can effectively promote the mycelium growth of Morchella, and the optimized formula was applied to Morchella cultivation to promote further development of the industry. It is therefore necessary to accurately investigate the habitats as well as the detailed conditions in which specific mushrooms are grown, in order to make their cultivation in facilities possible. In addition, the investigation of wild resources will also put forward the endangered grade of macrofungi species through data analysis, and provide direction for species protection and sustainable development.

The purpose of this Special Issue is to publish the analyses and studies of the biological characteristics, domesticated cultivation methods, and factory production of edible fungi (such as Sparassis latifolia, Phlebopus portentosus, Stropharia rugoso, Ophiocordyceps sinensis, etc.) which have been successfully domesticated and produced in recent years. Therefore, the development and utilization of new forest edible fungus resources can be based on evidence, and so lay a solid foundation for the diversified development of edible fungus industry.

Major Fields of the Special Issue (Review or Research papers expected)

1. Symbiotic phenomena of rare mushrooms in forest habitats and dependencies.
2. Innovative cultivation methods of saprophyte mushrooms.
3. Mushrooms and Climate Warming.
4. Cultivation methods of rare forest habitat mushrooms.

Prof. Dr. Nick Sigrimis
Prof. Yu Li
Dr. George Fotiadis
Guest Editors

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• edible fungi
• nutritional-absorbed methods
• environmental physiology
• genetic characteristics
• domestication and cultivation
• biological characteristics
• factory production