Mycoremediation: Current State and Perspectives

Abstract

360 International Journal of Medicinal Mushrooms Mycoremediation (also called fungal treatment or fungal-based technology) is the application of fungi in remediation of polluted soils and aqueous effl uents. Th e fungi mostly used are wood-rot Basidiomycetes capable of degrading lignin (ligninolytic fungi). Most of these fungi cause white rot of wood, and so they are often called white-rot fungi (WRF). Th e ability of WRF to degrade lignin is due to a complex of extracellular enzymes—namely, lignin peroxidase, manganese dependent peroxidase, hydrogen peroxide generating oxidases, and phenol oxidases such as laccase. Th e lignin peroxidases were fi rst discovered in the basidiomycete Phanerochaete chrysosporium Burds., and in the 1980s this fungus was the main experimental model in lignin degradation research. Due to the nonspecifi c character of radical-mediated reactions of ligninolytic enzymes, the degradation of a wide variety of xenobiotic compounds, having an aromatic structure like lignin, has become a subject of extensive research.