Co-cultured Production of Lignin-Modifying Enzymes with White-Rot Fungi Chen Qi-he & Sven Krügener & Thomas Hirth & Steffen Rupp & Susanne Zibek Received: 25 November 2010 / Accepted: 16 May 2011 / Published online: 7 June 2011 # Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2011 Abstract Co-cultivation was a potential strategy in lignocellulolytic biodegradation with producing high activity enzymes due to their synergistic action. The objective of this study was to investigate the rarely understood effects of co-culturing of two white-rot fungi on lignin-modifying enzymes (LMEs) production. Six species, Bjerkandera adusta, Phlebia radiata, Pleurotus ostreatus, Dichomitus squalens, Hypoxylon fragiforme and Pleurotus eryngii, were cultured in pairs to study the production of LMEs. The paired hyphal interaction observed showed that P. eryngii is not suitable for co-growth. The use of agar plates containing dye RBBR showed elevated decolourisation at the confrontation zone between mycelia. Laccase was significantly stimulated only in the co-culture of P. radiata with D. squalens under submerged cultivation; the highest value was measured after 4 days of incubation (120 U mg -1 ). The improved productions of MnP and LiP were simultaneously observed at the co-culture of P. ostreatus and P. radiata (MnP=800 nkat L -1 after 4 days of incubation; LiP=60 nkat L -1 after 7 days of incubation), though it was not a good producer of Appl Biochem Biotechnol (2011) 165:700–718 DOI 10.1007/s12010-011-9289-9 Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s12010-011-9289-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. C. Qi-he Department of Food Science and Nutrition, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310029, China e-mail: chenqh@zju.edu.cn S. Krügener : T. Hirth : S. Rupp : S. Zibek (*) Fraunhofer-Institute for Interfacial Engineering and Biotechnology, Nobelstraße 12, 70569 Stuttgart, Germany e-mail: susanne.zibek@igb.fraunhofer.de S. Krügener e-mail: sven.kruegener@igb.fraunhofer.de T. Hirth e-mail: thomas.hirth@igb.fraunhofer.de S. Rupp e-mail: steffen.rupp@igb.fraunhofer.de T. Hirth Institute for Interfacial Engineering, University of Stuttgart, Stuttgart, Germany