Fungus (plural fungi), has been existing on Earth about 1,300 million years ago, long before trees overtook the land by about 700 million years ago.  The fungi kingdom includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds, as well as the more familiar mushrooms, which are fruiting bodies of certain fungi.  

 

The Importance of Fungi

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Fungi live everywhere that moisture is present: in water, in the soil, in the air, on plants & animals and in human body.  These nearly 144,000 known species of organisms play an important role within ecosystems, transforming organic matter into forms that can be taken up by plants.  They are also food source of many animals.

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Fungi are essential to many household and industrial processes.

 

Fungi for Food

Humans have collected and grown mushrooms for food for thousands of years.  Yeasts and other fungi are used in bread baking, brewing alcoholic beverages and fermenting a wide variety of foods, including soy sauce and cheeses.

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Fungi for Pest Control

Fungi can replace pesticides as a natural non-toxic substance to control pathogenic bacteria and insect pests on crops. Fungi compete with bacteria for nutrients and space, and they parasitize insects that eat plants.

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Other Uses of Fungi

Fungi can produce antibiotics such as penicillin, which has saved countless lives since it was developed in the late 1920s.  They can be genetically engineered to produce insulin and other human hormones.

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Fungi is the Gift of Nature  because of ... Mycelium

 

In the new bioeconomy, fungi play a very important role in addressing major global challenges, thanks to the magic substance, mycelium.

 

Mycelium (singular, mycelia) is the vegetative part and root structure of a fungus, consisting of a network of fine white filaments, hyphae, which is a mass of interwoven, single-cell wide structure.  Collectively, masses of hyphae are known as the mycelium.   Mycelia is the main part of the fungus that lives inside the substrate (wood, straw, grain, etc) while the mushrooms that we eat are just a small visible part of the organism.

 

Mycelium is one of the largest living organisms on Earth. Mycelium grows out by apical tip expansion of hyphae from a spore.  The hypha initiates random branching to form a random fiber network structure that enable the plants to communicate with one another and exchange nutrients.

 

Because of its filamentous network structure, Mycelium, when harnessed as a technology, helps replace plastics (proven to take years to decompose) as a packaging material, replace traditional meat (with same nutritional values but produced with a much smaller environmental footprint), replace building bricks. 

  

Mycology, the study of fungi, and the harnessing of mycelium technology enable us to grow mycelium that results in limited waste and at minimal energy consumption.  Research on mycelium is accelerating.  We are expecting more mycelium-based applications to solve the challenges that humans are facing, and to build a more sustainable world.