NUSANTARA BIOSCIENCE ISSN: 2087-3948 Vol. 6, No. 2, pp. 173-185 E-ISSN: 2087-3956 November 2014 DOI: 10.13057/nusbiosci/n060211 Mushroom refinement endeavor auspicate non green revolution in the offing SHAUKET AHMED PALA 1,♥ , ABDUL HAMID WANI 1 , ROUF HAMZA BODA 1 , BILAL AHMAD WANI 2 1 Section of Mycology and Plant pathology, Department of Botany University of Kashmir, Hazratbal Srinagar-190006, Jammu and Kashmir, India. Tel: +91-9858709043; ♥ email: sapala29@gmail.com. 2 Centre of Research for Development, University of Kashmir, Hazratbal Srinagar-190006, Jammu and Kashmir, India. Manuscript received: 22 August 2014. Revision accepted: 2 October 2014. Abstract. Pala SA, Wani AH, Boda RH, Wani BA. 2014. Mushroom refinement endeavor auspicate non green revolution in the offing. Nusantara Bioscience 6: 173-185. Mushroom can serve as food, tonic, and as medicine thus make people healthier, fitter and happier. They have a cracking potential for generating great socioeconomic impact in human welfare at local, national and international level. With the help of allied mushroom farming we can easily tackle the problem of food for growing world population; reduce environmental pollution by bioconversion of huge organic wastes into mushrooms; recycle huge quantity of organic wastes to mushroom crops, biofertilizers, and biogas; restore damaged environment by mushroom mycelia through mycoforestry, mycoremediation, mycofiltration and mycopesticides in a zero emission fashion. They can be used to degrade radioactive industrial biocide wastes in an eco-friendly fashion. Since mushroom cultivation is an indoor agribusiness, it could have great economic impact by generating employment, income and functional food requirements for rural people especially in developing countries. How far mushroom cultivation can meet the functional food requirements; address the domestic food challenges, rising food prices and crisis vis a vis environmental sustainability will be thrust areas of this communication. Keywords: Medicinal value, mushroom cultivation, non green revolution, production. INTRODUCTION Prior to touching the multitude affairs of mushrooms for human welfare on this biosphere we need their proper introduction. The word ‘mushroom’ is a loosely-used term that actually refers to the macroscopic fruiting body of fungus. The fruiting bodies are extremely diverse in form; some look amorphous globs of jelly, while others are umbrella like, reminiscent of coral, egg like, birds nest like, starfish shaped etc. One of the most widely accepted definition regarding mushrooms is stated by Chang and Miles “Mushroom is regarded as a macrofungus with a distinctive fruiting body, that can be either epigeous or hypogeous and large enough to be seen with naked eye and to be picked by hand” (Chang and Miles 1992). They mostly belong to class basidiomycetes and ascomycetes of Kingdom fungi. Current studies estimate that out of 1.5 million species of existing fungi, 14,000-15,000 species produce fruiting bodies of sufficient size and suitable structure to be considered as mushrooms (Hawksworth 2001). Of these, about 7000 species are considered to possess varying degree of edibility, and more than 3000 species from 31 genera are regarded as prime edible mushrooms and some 2000 species have medicinal attributes. Contrary to this vast diversity only a handful of species have been exploited by mankind for human welfare and there are about 100 of them grown experimentally, 50 economically cultivated, around 30 commercially cultivated, and only about 6 have reached to industrial scale of production (Chang and Miles 2004). Though this diversity is fouled by some poisonous mushrooms which are clumsy but their number is relatively small (approximately 10%), of these some 30 species are considered to be lethal. MUSHROOMS OFFER A RAINBOW OF PRODUCTS AND SERVICES Mushrooms offer a range of food products, medicines and ecological services. Their medicinal and food value is an intermingling area of functional food products. Mushrooms act as a balanced food for all ages. In health sector mushrooms have proved their worth by warding off simple to severe diseases. Mushroom derived medicines have potential to increase immunity of our body thus reducing chances of disease susceptibility. Ecologically mushrooms play role of biofilters and biofertilizers. Mushrooms are important constituents of minor forest produce (secondary produce) and grow on the most abundant biomolecule of this biosphere known as cellulose. They can degrade, neutralize or accumulate pollutants of different kinds. They add to the fertility of soil without damaging it. A bird’s eye view of these lineaments is as under. Nutritional value of mushrooms Mushrooms as food were used by man when he was still a food gatherer and hunter on the chronology of cultural evolution (Rojas and Mansur 1995; Kumari et al. 2013; Thatoi and Singdevsachan 2014). Edible mushrooms once called the “food of the gods” are still used to garnish the dishes and serve as functional food. Mushrooms are important source of quality protein, minerals and various novel compounds of medicinal value. They are rich sources