Current Progress in Breeding of Edible and Pharmaceutical Mushrooms

Abstract

The objective in breeding of edible and pharmaceutical mushrooms is to produce the strain that is suited for commercial production of high quality fruit bodies at lower running cost. The breeding of a new mushroom species is based on the selection of genetic variants that produced fruit bodies of desirable quality and appearance from wild genetic resources. The selected fruit bodies would be used as a source material for the preparation of the next generation of seed spawn by crossing. The breeding of new hybrid strain is performed by the four successive processes as follows : the selection of two parental dikaryons, the production of monokaryotic line stocks from parental dikaryons, the production of various hybrid dikaryons by crossing between the two selected monokaryotic line stocks, and several levels of cultivation tests of the crossing products for selecting superior hybrid. In this review, current progress in research and development of commercial mushroom breeding is introduced.