long, hands-on training sessions in Tucson, Arizona. As you can imagine, Andy Weil, AWCIM founder and


director, and also world famous for his work with fungi added: “Integrative medicine has long recognized the value of traditional methods of healing. I’m thrilled to have this generous donation from my long-time friend and colleague Paul Stamets, a leader in the field of mycology and foremost researcher of medicinal properties of mushrooms.” Dr. Weil created the Fellowship in 2000. Since then, more than 1,800 health care professionals from around the world have been trained through the program. About the Andrew Weil Center for Integrative Medicine:


Te AWCIM at the University of Arizona is leading the transformation of health care by creating, educating and actively supporting a community that embodies the philosophy and practice of healing-oriented medicine. Te AWCIM is internationally recognized for its evidence-based clinical practice, innovative educational programs and research that substantiates the field of integrative medicine and influences public policy. Since its creation in 1994, the AWCIM’s vision of making integrative care available to all is being realized worldwide: AWCIM graduates are now guiding more than 10 million patients to take a greater role in their health and healing.


The latest truffle cultivation success story in the New World? Quebec!


I


know what you’re thinking: truffles … Quebec? Yes, it’s true and actually we have native truffles all over North America. And it seems that a fellow in Quebec decided to try cultivating native species and found one from the Appalachian region to be well suited to cultivation. In Quebec (and why not, a large portion of the recorded species of mushrooms are known from this region). Te long road to commercial cultivation of truffles in Quebec


began several years ago. While a student at the University of Sherbrooke, Jérôme Quirion took an interest in symbioses among plants and fungi, and especially the mycorrhizal sort. He was about to register for the master’s degree (he was just 25 years old at the time) but a decisive meeting convinced him to instead embark on the research and development of truffle plants adapted to the Quebec climate. It was during his practical internship in 2009 that he discovered the existence of ten indigenous Quebec truffles, including the Appalachian truffle (Tuber canaliculatum), a local product with strong commercial and gastronomic potential. His meeting with James Trappe of the US Forest Service, a pioneer of truffle systematics in North America, gave him wings. Tis great mycology enthusiast praised the merits of this rare mushroom, but also told him about James Beard, a famous New York chef who fell in love with our Appalachian truffle. “We have nothing to envy Europeans,” he would have declared after having cooked it for the first time. Also in 2009 he met the great French truffle expert, Henri Frochot, who encouraged him to try the Burgundy truffle (the grapes from Burgundy grow well, in Quebec, why not the truffle as well?). He was hooked! In 2010, Quirion founded the Arborinnov company to work on his new


12 FUNGI Volume 14:4 Fall 2021


project. He planted nearly 2,000 trees. After seven years of work, he and his team finally had the recipe for establishing the symbiosis necessary for the growth of these fungi in the roots of truffle trees. He has since added another truffle of Europe, the bianchetto. Quiron is now at the helm of two companies: Truffes Quebec in Granby, whose mission is to develop the truffle sector in Quebec, and Arborinnov, which now produces truffle plants from different varieties of trees, including several species of oak, hornbeam, hickory, American and hybrid hazel, and white pine. Tey are the first in the world to cultivate Appalachian truffles and have also succeeded in growing Burgundy truffles, a luxury product very popular in Europe. Te information in this article came from press releases, news articles, and the Arborinnov website; for more information, see truffesquebec.com.


And finally … COVID and fungi, part I


Y


ou cannot blame mycologists really, the pandemic has gotten to all of us. Pop culture has been swept up


(examples include a new drink called the quarantini and a racehorse called Wearamask, and others). And so it is that two new fungal species now have pandemic-inspired monikers. In the first case, tiny, fungal leopard spots on saw palmetto leaves turned out to be new to science. Despite looks, they belong to the same family (Xylariaceae) as Dead Man’s Fingers, very familiar to mycophiles. Indeed the leopard spots are not just a new species but represent a whole new genus, Diablocovidia, announced in an edition of Persoonia late last year (Vol. 44: 301; doi: https://doi.org/10.3767/persoonia.2020.44.11.). A fitting name as it translates to “devilish COVID.” In the second case, Purdue University biologist Danny Haelewaters (who has written for FUNGI several times) was supposed to be on six-nation field trip from Panama to eastern Russia. Instead, he was COVID-grounded in West Lafayette, Ind., and socially distant from his coauthor André De Kesel, a mycologist at Belgium’s Meise Botanic Garden. Haelewaters is well known for finding new species of enigmatic laboul fungi (often hidden in plain sight among museum collections of arthropods). His new fungus species has a pandemic- themed name, Laboulbenia quarantenae, and is known only as microscopic sexually reproducing hairlike tufts on one species of ground beetle. Te description appears in MycoKeys Vol. 71: 23; doi: 10.3897/mycokeys.71.53421.


COVID and fungi, part II O


n a much more serious note… COVID-19 continues to bring thousands of people into hospitals every day around


the world—but their coronavirus infections are not always the direct reason they die. Dangerous secondary infections by opportunistic pathogens are common in intensive care units, and physicians are raising the alarm about a particular microbial threat to COVID-19 patients: Aspergillus (incl. A. fumigatus and A. flavus). A number of news reports and medical journals have been reporting mounting evidence that suggests infection with SARS-CoV-2—and possibly the drugs used to treat it—makes COVID-19 patients especially


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