Why We Need Mushrooms

In your book you give a long list of diseases that mycomedicines might be used for, including not only influenza, but also HIV and cancer. If we find an amazing new medicinal use for mushrooms what happens next? Are there issues with overharvesting valuable wild mushrooms?

Our research on the antiviral properties of mushrooms shows that the mycelium is a better source than the mushrooms themselves. Hence, new mycomedicines are best grown in laboratories, under strict conditions. This will assure purity. However, all strains come from nature, and we need to screen as many wild strains as possible to find the most potent ones and to ultimately find the gene sequences responsible for their expression.

I am concerned about the over-harvesting of wild mushrooms, particularly rare species in increasingly threatened ecosystems. I have a library of strains, many obtained from now-destroyed habitats, in the hope that these will prove valuable.

Cooking and Eating

You've done a lot of work with the nutritional content of mushrooms. Should we all be growing mushrooms in our backyards?

Many beneficial, nutritional and immune enhancing properties are gained through the eating of cooked mushrooms. In Mycelium Running, I outline methods of growing mushroom species in your backyard, customized to the health needs of your family.

Is there any one type of mushroom that you think we should all be eating more of?

I think a combination of these mushrooms offer exceptional benefits: shiitake, maitake, enoki, oyster, nameko and lion's mane, but, only when they have been thoroughly cooked. Raw mushrooms offer little to negligible nutritional benefit since many of the nutrients are locked into the tough chitin-like cells which are the building blocks of the mushroom. 

We're very interested in food sources of Vitamin D, because there’s a lot of new research suggesting we all need more of this nutrient. (For example, you can get it from eggs.) Studies have found that some types of mushrooms are a surprisingly good source of Vitamin D when they're exposed to UV light — either sunlight or artificial light. What can you tell us about your research in this area?

What is interesting about my research is the evidence that not only can normal, summer sunlight spike production of Vitamin D in fresh mushrooms, but that sun-exposure for dried mushrooms also provides a significant amount of Vitamin D, even if those mushrooms were picked months earlier during the fall or spring seasons, or grown indoors. One test with indoor-grown shiitake mushrooms, which had approximately 40 IUs of Vitamin D per 100 grams, spiked to more than 30,000 IUs after two days of summer sun exposure. But, after three days of about six hours of exposure per day, the accumulated Vitamin D begins to decline.