Video: Engineer floats on boat made of mushrooms
WHAT do you call a man with a mushroom on his head? A fun guy. , though, is deadly serious. He is on a mission to save the world, and his choice of headgear tells you how he plans to do it. 鈥淲e need to invest in fungi,鈥� he says.
Mention the word fungus to most people, and the likely response is a shudder. Fungus is the mould on bread, the mildew on the ceiling, the infection in an unfortunate place. But that鈥檚 a tad unfair. Fungus is also the yeast that made the bread and our frothing pint of beer, not to mention the blue graining in our gourmet cheese. As with many long-term relationships, humankind and mould are bonded in love and hate.
If Stamets and his ilk get their way, this relationship is about to experience a fresh bloom of love. A slew of fungal technologies is creeping out of the woodwork, and they promise everything from better drugs, environmentally friendly materials and green fuels to鈥� well, tomorrow鈥檚 fashion tips. Is this the dawning of the age of the fungus?
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See what it鈥檚 like to wear a fungus: 鈥�Fungal fashion: mushrooms 脿 la mode鈥�
In point of fact, fungi have always been our allies, says , a mycologist and passionate advocate of mushrooms at Cardiff University in the UK. 鈥淲ithout fungi, planet Earth wouldn鈥檛 work,鈥� she says. 鈥淵ou would be up to your armpits in dead stuff.鈥�
(Image: Axel Schmidt/plainpicture)
Most of their action happens out of sight. A fungus might have a toadstool poking up from the forest floor or a tree stump, but its business end lies in a mass of filaments called the mycelium that can spread vast distances beneath. 鈥淎 mushroom is just the tip of the iceberg,鈥� says . 鈥淓xcept there鈥檚 only nine-tenths of an iceberg below the surface.鈥�
Consider , also known as the honey mushroom. In the Malheur National Forest in eastern Oregon, outcrops of its attractive yellow fruiting body are the only visible sign of what is thought to be the world鈥檚 largest organism. , its single subterranean mycelium is more than 2000 years old and extends possibly as much as 10 square kilometres.
Fungi have more to offer than just bulk, though. 鈥淭hey are remarkable chemists,鈥� says Boddy. The mycelium is also the fungus鈥檚 chemical powerhouse, secreting enzymes that break down surrounding organic material 鈥� or even rocks 鈥� and so release the nutrients into the soil. Many fungi also produce volatile chemicals to defend their territory against bacteria, insects and other fungi.
Boddy鈥檚 speciality is wood-decaying fungi. 鈥淭hey are good fighters,鈥� she says. In her lab, she observes the elaborate strategies they develop to ensure they are first in the buffet queue to feed on juicy dead wood, including throttling each other鈥檚 mycelia and producing clouds of chemicals to beat back competitors.
鈥淔ungi are good fighters, throttling each other and making clouds of chemicals to beat back competitors鈥�
The chemical activity of some mushrooms has long been held in high esteem. There鈥檚 the effects of magic mushrooms containing the psychoactive ingredient psilocybin and, more prosaically, the antibacterial properties of the soil-dwelling genus Penicillium. Mutual antagonism between fungal species has also been exploited, for example in the use of spores to control Heterobasidion annosum, a major cause of root rot in conifer plantations.
, a microbiologist at Montana State University in Bozeman, thinks there are many more possibilities. A decade ago, while on a field trip to an area of ancient forest in Patagonia, he found a wood-decaying fungus whose chemical fug seemed to consist largely of volatile organic compounds of the sort found in diesel fuel. The fungus has since been identified as a strain of 鈥� commonly known as jelly drops on account of its purple, gelatinous fruiting bodies. Back in Bozeman, Strobel built a reaction vessel like an overblown kitchen sink to see if he could get it to do the same in the lab.
After a lot of tinkering, he had a fungal mix that took just three weeks to turn dead leaf matter into a serviceable 鈥渕ycodiesel鈥� fuel. 鈥淚鈥檝e put it into my motorbike and it works just fine,鈥� he says. Unlike conventional ways of making biofuels, such as using yeast to ferment cash crops into ethanol, this process could potentially feed off freely available agricultural waste. Strobel is now working to commercialise the idea.
Eben Bayer thinks this fungal fuel might one day power a mushroom motor. CEO of a company called , he made his name with biodegradable mushroom packaging, supplying the computer giant Dell among others. But he doesn鈥檛 stop there. 鈥淚f you think plastics are a wonder material, mycelium should be in that same category,鈥� he says.
Like plastic, mycelium is formed of a flexible polymer material, in this case chitin. It鈥檚 fully biodegradable 鈥� and smart to boot. Given different starting materials, temperatures and humidity, it can be coaxed to grow to different densities and orientations and so produce materials with a wide range of properties such as tensile strength. 鈥淲e point it in the right direction and it takes care of the details,鈥� says Bayer. His company is currently cooking up projects from medical implants that make synthetic bone using mycelium as a scaffold to fire-resistant insulating foam 鈥� and even moulded mushroom parts for electric cars.
For Stamets, such solutions are small mushroom fry. While the hats he wears are a symbol of mushroom technologies past (see 鈥�Mushrooms 脿 la mode鈥�), he sees us marching towards a sunlit fungal future. In 2008 he gave a talk at a TED conference entitled 鈥溾�� that has since been viewed 1.7 million times and counting. 鈥淗e is the epitome of mushroom fame,鈥� says Bayer.
鈥淭he path to the future is the path of the mycelium,鈥� says Stamets. It sounds like cod philosophy, but his company, , has amassed more than 30 mushroom-based patents spanning a range of environmental and medicinal applications. His biggest idea is 鈥渕ycorestoration鈥�: applying what he describes as 鈥済uilds鈥� of appropriate fungi to soil to enhance productivity, clean up contamination and speed up carbon sequestration to mitigate climate change.
鈥淒ifferent 鈥榞uilds鈥� of fungi could be added to soil to clean up contamination or speed carbon capture鈥�
Other inventions include 鈥渕ycobooms鈥�, floating hemp socks filled with mycelium that secrete oil-destroying enzymes in contaminated water. His most recent patents are on what he claims is a universal insecticide and an antiviral substance derived from the wood-decaying fungus , commonly known as agarikon or quinine conk, owing to its extremely bitter taste.
Fuels, medicines, materials, environmental clean-up services 鈥� the breadth of potential fungal applications is underlined by a banner on the website of Bayer鈥檚 company. After the Stone Age, various metal ages and the plastic age, it declares, 鈥渨elcome to the Mushroom Age鈥�. That鈥檚 not entirely tongue-in-cheek, says Bayer. 鈥淲e鈥檙e actually pretty serious about that.鈥�
Stamets is even more definite. If we want a quick, easy fix to problems of human health, environmental degradation and the drivers of climate change, we need to embrace the suite of services offered by our fungal brethren 鈥� and fast. 鈥淭ime is short, very short,鈥� he says. And if it doesn鈥檛 work, he鈥檒l eat his hat.
Mushrooms 脿 la mode
There鈥檚 one area in which fungi have rarely been out of fashion: fashion itself. Particularly headwear. New 杏吧原创鈥榮 interest in mushroom millinery was first piqued by a letter in which a reader referred us to a remarkable claim made of giant puffball mushrooms in a 1960s children鈥檚 book (22 June, p 64). 鈥淟arge fungi of this kind,鈥� the book declared baldly, 鈥渃an be made into men鈥檚 hats, and they are very light and comfortable.鈥�
It鈥檚 an appealing idea. Like oversized golf balls, giant puffballs, or , can grow up to 1.5 metres across. Sadly, it is almost certainly a case of mistaken identity. Mushroom hats of the sort worn by mycologist Paul Stamets (see main story) are made not from puffballs, but from amadou. This felt-like substance is derived from horse hoof fungus or , a bracket fungus that grows predominantly on beech and birch trees. Amadou can also be used as tinder or fish bait, but the tradition of making it into hats has survived .
If mushroom millinery is not to your taste, perhaps other fungal clothing may suit you better. The inhabitants of some South Pacific islands make dresses from rhizomorphs. These fungi form networks that dangle from tree branches, catching leaves and other falling organic material to consume before it reaches the forest floor.
Fungal garments have even made it to the catwalk. A couple of years ago, designer of Kingston University in London visited Lynne Boddy鈥檚 lab at Cardiff University, UK, to learn how to grow mushrooms in culture. She has since incorporated live fungal moulds into dresses and vests, , that allow the wearer to observe the whole fungal life cycle from growth to decay. The aim is not only to develop sustainable materials based on fungi, but to give mushrooms an image makeover. 鈥淲e are looking to inspire a positive shift in the social perception of these organisms,鈥� says Ivanova.
On a more macabre note, the US artist is designing a funeral suit made from a strain of flesh-eating fungus that helps the . The artist hopes her invention will encourage people to come to terms with their own demise. Either that, or they won鈥檛 be seen dead in a piece of fungal fashion.
This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淢agic mushrooms鈥�
