FungiColor in a nutshell

The clip shows my research project in a nutshell. Starting point is a mushroom in the forest, that is then growing in time-lapse in the laboratory on a petri dish. Afterwards we see the first step towards biotechnological production of the desired colorants: a time-lapse of the fungi growing in liquid nutrition media in an Erlenmeyer flask. This culture is harvested and subsequently extracted in a soxhlet extractor. Finally we gain the color-extract, which is ready to be applied in the end-product.

That’s what project FungiColor is about: Natural colorants from Basidiomycota.
Nowadays, we are still facing the application of petrochemically synthesized dyes in textiles and cosmetics, that cause (well-known) environmental issues and health concerns. The plant-based alternatives struggle with stability issues, higher prices and seasonable changes. The biotechnological approach is independent of environmental conditions and combined with the ability of higher fungi, to grow on side-streams of the agro-industry; this may provide a real eco-friendly and sustainable production strategy!