engleski

Waste biomass of mushroom Agaricus bisporus as a source of β-glucans

INTRODUCTION Agaricus bisporus (known as white button mushroom or champignon) is one of the most cultivated mushrooms in the world. Their good nutritional characteristics due to the low fat, high protein and low carbohydrate content, among which dietary fibers are predominant, make champignons an almost ideal dietary foodstuff. Champignons also contain vitamins and minerals, various compounds with antioxidative activity (mostly polyphenols) and polysaccharides such as β-glucan. Several fungal species produce β-(1, 3)(1, 6)-D-glucans. This group of compounds posess medicinal properties, such as immunostimulation, anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, antitumoral, hepatoprotective, cholesterol-lowering as well as antifibrotic, antidiabetic, and hypoglycemic activity. β-Glucans are also mentioned as components of functional food. Waste champignon biomass is a secondary product which is gained during the harvesting stage. It contains lower parts of champignon stalks as well as mushrooms whose size and shape are inappropriate for sale. Although this material is edible, there is not a suitable market for its distribution in Croatia. To prevent disposal of a large quantity of such waste, it could be used as a source of bioactive polysaccharides. METHODOLOGY The waste champignon biomass served as a raw material for isolation of soluble polysaccharides by water extraction and ethanol precipitation. The isolated crude polysaccharides were air-dried and lyophilized. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION The obtained preparations had significantly different morphology, depending on the drying method applied. Air dried samples of crude polysaccharides contained 44.18 % of total carbohydrates, 27.95 % of total glucan, 11.57 % of α-glucan and 16.37 % of β-glucan. Both FT-IR spectra of dried waste champignon biomass and air-dried or lyophilized polysaccharide preparations showed typical spectral pattern of β-(1, 3)-glucan. CONCLUSIONS The obtained results showed that the waste biomass of Agaricus bisporus could be used for isolation of β-glucans or the biomass itself could be used as a source of β-glucans.

Agaricus bisporus; β-glucan; polysaccharides; waste biomass

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