Selection, cultivation and biochemical analysis of fungi with pharmacological properties.

The importance of medicinal mushrooms has rapidly increased in the last decades thanks to the numerous studies carried out on their beneficial properties and the isolation of bioactive compounds able to bring significant benefits to human health. Among the most studied are found in particular, the saprotrophic fungi Lentinula edodes and Pleurotus ostreatus, belonging to the phylum Basidiomycota. Their economic and commercial interest has rapidly grown thanks to new methods of cultivation on substrates made ad hoc that allow to obtain high yields and high-quality mushrooms. The main purpose of this PhD thesis is to characterize the shiitake and oyster strains collected by different world banks, both commercial and research, comparing their activities and evaluating their beneficial potentials to create high-potential food products for the market of Italian and international functional food. In order to achieve this goal, different properties were evaluated, and two cultivation methods were compared, one on a commercial substrate based on sawdust and straw and the second on hardwood logs using a traditional method. This research project allows to select specific strains according to the type of activity considered, also evaluating production costs, yields and timing in order to create food products for the functional food market.