"Fungi Treasures"

Mo Mei Chen, Visiting Scholar, Mycology and Plant Pathology, University and Jepson Herbaria

DATE:	Wednesday, April 2, 2008
TIME:	12:00 PM
PLACE:	3401 Dwinelle Hall
FORMAT:	Brown-bag lunch lecture
SPONSORS:	Center for Chinese Studies

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More than 1,800 years ago, during the Eastern Han Dynasty in China, people began to discover and use wild mushrooms for their unique medicinal properties. Today, San Francisco Bay Area residents know many of the precious edible mushrooms such as “ Dong Chong Xia Cao”, “Ling Zhi” etc. but few know about their medicinal values.

In the history of mushroom cultivation, people have never been satisfied with their current achievements. Mushroom cultivation is a science that is compatible to horticulture science, and many superb wild mushrooms have been domesticated.  Among the 10,000 species of wild fungi across the world, more than half of them have economic values to different degrees, and some 2000 of these have important edible and medicinal value. But there are only a few that can be domesticated, and very little work has been to-date in this field.  Until the 1970’s, the world mushroom trade was dominated by button-mushrooms, with more than 140 countries or areas in different continents producing this single variety.  Shiitake, woodear, oyster and others are now more widely cultivated, but are limited to certain regional species, with different outputs in East Asia and Europe.  With the opening and economic development of China, and concurrent increase in people’s living standards, their consumption styles have changed and they now pursue new healthy foods, which has created a new demand for mushrooms. While paying special attention to the reform of traditional cultivation technology, people also place importance on domestication and species introduction. In Mo-Mei Chen’ "The Mushroom Treasures" (1982-2008), she introduces 150 varieties of these irreplaceable gifts of nature, and describes their medicinal uses and cultivation techniques.