2012 Class: you are not responsible for question 13b, 14,15, 17, 18 and 20. You are not responsible for the Biofuels and Ethanol production section.
1. What are the two broad categories for which fungi are used in Industrial Applications? Give examples of each category, and the fungus that is used for this purpose.
2. From what was citric acid (CA) isolated prior to its purification from fungi? From what fungus is CA isolated now?
b. What are 3 uses of CA?
c. What are two methods of production? Which do you think would be able to give greater yields?
d. What features of growth are controlled to get best production of CA?
3. Saccharomyces cerevisiae is one of the most important industrial microbes. Support this statement.
4. Why does S. cerevisiae produce ethanol in beer and wine, but not in bread?
5. Are all edible mushrooms members of the same phylum? Explain giving specific fungal species.
6. What are secondary metabolites? How do they differ from primary metabolites?
b. When are they produced during fungal growth?
c.Are individual products produced by a broad group of fungi or limited to a few species? Explain why this might be the case.
7. a. What are two different antibiotics produced from fungi?
b. Is griseofulvin an antibiotic? What is its mode of action and what organisms is it effective against?
c. Alexander Fleming, Ernst Chain and Howard Florey won the Nobel Prize for isolation and identification of peincillin? How did Fleming first identify the antibiotic action of this compound?
d. What were important steps to improve the production of penicillin? How much did the improvements improve yield?
e. From what fungal species is penicillin presently isolated? Was this the original species in which it was found? Explain.
f. The penicillins are actually a class of antibiotics. How are the different compounds similar and how are they different from each other?
g. What is the mode of action of the penicillins?
8. From what is the enzyme invertase isolated and how is it used in food production?
9. Fungi play two different roles in cheese production, one in an early stage and others in the late stages. In the early stage, fungi may be used to produce an enzyme, chymosin (rennet). Which fungi do this, and what is chymosin? Are fungi the only source of rennet used to make cheese? Explain.
b. Different fungi are used during ripening of cheese. Which ones, and what do they do?
c. What steps were used to improve production of chymosin?
10. Are PR toxins produced by Penicillium roquefortii, a problem in the cheese industry? Explain.
11. What is cyclosporin A and how is it used in medicine? Was the fungus initially identified based on its anamorph or teleomorph stage? Explain.
b. It was initially isolated as a potential antibiotic. Why was it not developed as one?
12. Fungi play important roles in the production of steroids. Explain whether a single fungus usually produces a steroid drug or not. Do fungi produce the initial precursors to synthesis of steroids such as cortisone and prednisolone or what is its source?
13. Are truffles "typical" mushrooms? Explain.
b. Are truffles free-growing or found in limited areas? Explain.
c. How are truffles harvested? Why are animals helpful? Will any animal do?
14. Paper production may involve chemical pulping, mechanical pulping, or biopulping, which combines fungal treatment of wood chips before a mechanical process.
a. What do we mean by "pulp"?
b. in biopulping, what type of fungi are used to "treat" the wood chips, and what do they do?
c. How does biopulping improve the quality of the paper produced by mechanical pulping of paper? Or in other words, what are the limitations of using only mechanical pulping?
d. Most paper is currently made by chemical pulping. What are the advantages of this method? What is its major disadvantage?
e. What are white rot fungi vs. brown rot fungi? In what phylum are they found? How do they differ in terms of the way they degrade wood?
15. Why are fungal enzymes useful in place of chemicals for certain industrial uses?
16. a. What advantages are there to producing fungal enzymes using recombinant DNA technology instead of isolating them from the original fungus in which they were identified?
b. What do we mean by a "host" strain for enzyme production? What are some advantages of using a "host" strain? What is the advantage to Dyadic in using the host strain Chrysosporium lucknowense C1?
17. What are cellulases and how are they used in blue jean production?
18. What is Novobate and how is it used in the leather industry?
19. What is lactase and what are its industrial uses? From what is it isolated?
20. What is the enzyme found in "Beano" and why is it important for the breakdown of raffinose? From what is it isolated?
21. Why are fungi considered nutritious foods that could substitute for meat?
20. What is Quorn? From what is quorn produced? Why is it important that Quorn is NOT produced from Fusarium graminearum?
Biofuels and Ethanol Production from Lignocellulosic Material
1. Why is it advantageous to use lignocellulose material instead of corn or sugar cane to make ethanol for biofuels?
2. Lignocellulose is a mixture of what three plant polysaccharides?
b. What fungal enzymes break down these materials?
3. What are some sources of lignocellulose biomass that could be used for biofuels production?
4. Why is it thought to be necessary to pre-treat lignocellulosic biomass before it can be digested for ethanol production?