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Fungal Biorefinery: Mushrooming Opportunities

Summary

Scientists are discovering how fungi can be grown to create useful materials as alternatives to plastics and other petroleum-based products. By cultivating fungal filaments on agricultural waste, researchers can produce foam-like materials for packaging, strong fibers for textiles, and special carbon materials for energy storage. These fungi-based materials are biodegradable, help recycle waste, and require less energy to produce than traditional synthetic materials.

Background

Fungal biorefinery represents a rapidly evolving research area that has shifted from studying fungi as agents of decay to leveraging their positive characteristics for material innovation. Filamentous fungal growth (hyphae) can bind agricultural and forestry residues together through natural heterotrophic processes to create novel materials with practical applications.

Objective

This special issue presents recent research in fungal biorefinery, demonstrating how fungal-derived materials and processes can address Global Challenges objectives including sustainability, climate change, and environmental protection. The objective is to showcase the diverse applications and material properties achievable through fungal biorefinery platforms.

Results

Fungal materials demonstrated diverse properties including foam-like composites for packaging and insulation, high-strength monofilaments (up to 140 MPa tensile strength), self-healing concrete applications through biomineralization, and mesoporous carbon structures with superior surface areas (60-282 m²g⁻¹) and capacitance suitable for supercapacitors.

Conclusion

Fungal biorefinery represents a flexible, circular, bio-based manufacturing platform with potential to produce sustainable alternatives to fossil-derived polymers. Future research must focus on scalability, life cycle parameter improvement, and material property enhancement to ensure these innovations meet requirements for intended applications.
  • Published in:Global Challenges,
  • Study Type:Review,
  • Source: PMID: 39802047, DOI: 10.1002/gch2.202400315
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