DOE researchers find brown rot fungi can help with wood biofuel production

In Minnesota, a team of scientists from the University of Minnesota; the U.S. Forest Products Laboratory; the University of Wisconsin, Madison; Gyeongsangnam-do Agricultural Research and Extension Services, Republic of Korea; and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory found evidence that brown rot fungi separate the oxidants and enzymes in time rather than in space. The team discovered this two-step wood decomposition mechanism by designing a simple, yet elegant experiment: they grew brown rot fungi in one direction along thin wood specimens separating the stages of wood decay linearly across the substrate.