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Horticulturae
Special Issues
Morchella: Innovative Mushrooms from Forests to Farms, Then to Our...
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Morchella: Innovative Mushrooms from Forests to Farms, Then to Our Tables

A special issue of Horticulturae (ISSN 2311-7524). This special issue belongs to the section "Medicinals, Herbs, and Specialty Crops".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 December 2025 | Viewed by 427

Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Qi Zhao

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Guest Editor
Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming 650201, China
Interests: germplasmic resource; morphology; taxonomy; species diversity
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Wei Liu

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
Interests: whole genome; gene editing; genetics; breeding
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Hao Tan

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Sichuan Institute of Edible Fungi, Sichuan Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Chengdu 610000, China
Interests: microbial ecology; soil microbiome; ecophysiology; biochemistry
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Xi-Hui Du

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Guest Editor
College of Life Sciences, Chongqing Normal University, Chongqing 401331, China
Interests: taxonomy; mating type; population genetics; molecular evolution
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Morels are mushroom-forming macrofungi in the Morchella genus that are highly prized for their desirable aroma, delicious taste, and tender texture. Having a long history of food and medicinal applications in both Eastern and Western cultures, morels are consumed globally, contributing to a remarkable industry. Morels were once only wild-foraged from forests, shrubs, and grasslands, but several species (e.g., Morchella importuna, M. sextelata, M. eximia, and M. rufobrunnea) have been domesticated, with it becoming feasible to cultivate them artificially in substrate beds of soil or compost in recent decades. The scale of commercialized morel cultivation is expanding very rapidly not only in China but also in other countries, including the USA, France, Turkey, and Australia. While the innovative morel industry is thriving all over the world, several problems are always hampering its sustainable development, including a lack of cultivars with improved performances; a the technologies for stable and high yields still being underdeveloped; a lack of food processing technologies to elongate the shell life being prominent; the elucidation of the chemical constitution with healthy effects; and diversified and value-added morel products.

You may choose our Joint Special Issue in Journal of Fungi.

Prof. Dr. Qi Zhao
Dr. Wei Liu
Prof. Dr. Hao Tan
Dr. Xi-Hui Du
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Horticulturae is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2200 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • wild morel germplasm
  • morphology and cell biology
  • phylogenetics
  • mating type
  • breeding report of morel cultivar
  • genome and mitogenome
  • functional gene
  • transcriptional factor
  • genetics and epigenetics
  • gene editing
  • microbial physiology and biochemistry related to morel cultivation
  • transcriptome, proteome, and metabolome
  • soil microbial ecology of morel mycosphere
  • continuous cropping obstacle
  • identification of morel pathogens
  • biocontrol of morel pathogens
  • metabolites and bioactive compounds in morel fruiting-bodies
  • processing of morel products
  • food safety
  • pesticides
  • pesticide residues
  • heavy metals

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Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

14 pages, 6029 KiB  
Article
Investigation of the Impact of Soil Physicochemical Properties and Microbial Communities on the Successful Cultivation of Morchella in Greenhouses
by Xinhai Liu, Bo Yin, Liqiang Meng, Xiaoyu Zhao, Jialong Wang, Rui Liu, Lina Hu, Xiangxiang Wang, Yu Liu and Yinpeng Ma
Horticulturae 2025, 11(4), 356; https://doi.org/10.3390/horticulturae11040356 - 26 Mar 2025
Viewed by 223
Abstract
Morels (Morchella spp.) are medicinal and edible mushrooms, renowned for their distinctive taste and appearance. Due to the low yields and difficulty of foraging wild morels, artificial cultivation has significant economic value. Outdoor cultivation yields are influenced by factors such as weather [...] Read more.
Morels (Morchella spp.) are medicinal and edible mushrooms, renowned for their distinctive taste and appearance. Due to the low yields and difficulty of foraging wild morels, artificial cultivation has significant economic value. Outdoor cultivation yields are influenced by factors such as weather and diseases, which can result in crop instability or failure, thereby causing losses to farmers. Previous studies have typically concentrated on either the fungal or bacterial communities. In this study, we investigated the ecological relationships between morel growth and both the fungi and bacteria in soil, analyzed over multiple trophic levels. We investigated three soil types: soil in which morel death was observed (DM), soil in which no morels emerged (UM), and soil that is suitable for normal fruiting (NM). We used high-throughput ITS and 16S rDNA amplicon sequencing, alongside assessment of soil physicochemical properties, to investigate factors contributing to morel emergence and death. The results indicated that the richness and diversity of both fungal and bacterial communities in the normal fruiting soil (NM) were significantly higher than those in the non-fruiting soils (DM and UM). The bacterial community was primarily composed of Proteobacteria and Bacteroidota, while the fungal community was dominated by Ascomycota and Mucoromycota. Furthermore, Morchella was significantly enriched in NM, indicating that it had successfully colonized and could develop into fruiting bodies. The morel mycelium in NM effectively utilized external nutrient bags, enhancing the soil nitrogen and organic matter content while reducing the consumption of available phosphorus and potassium. LEfSe and random forest analyses identified Pedobacter and Massilia as biomarkers of NM, potentially associated with the symbiosis of Morchella, which may promote its growth. Furthermore, the construction of the fungal-bacterial co-occurrence network revealed that the NM soil exhibited a higher number of nodes and greater network stability, suggesting that its complex microbial community structure may play a crucial role in the successful cultivation of Morchella. Our results indicate that the failures in morel production were due to inadequate management practices. Elevated greenhouse temperatures may have promoted pathogen proliferation, hindering the effective utilization of external nutrient bags by morel mycelium. Consequently, the mycelium was unable to accumulate nutrients efficiently, leading to the inability of Morchella to fruit or resulting in developmental failures. This study offers valuable insights into the interactions between morel mycelium and soil microorganisms, elucidating the reasons for morel cultivation failure and suggesting strategies for optimizing morel cultivation. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Morchella: Innovative Mushrooms from Forests to Farms, Then to Our Tables)
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