In this study, the in-vitro antifungal activity and phytochemical analysis of Schizophyllum commune extracts have been investigated. The antifungal activity was tested against 11 species of selected wood degrading fungi of rubberwood. The results showed that water, methanol and ethanol extracts significantly inhibited the growth of wood degrading fungi with minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) ranges 0.16-5.00 μg/μL. P. sanguineus was found as the strongest wood degrading fungus where it required the highest concentration of S. commune crude extracts (≥ 5.00 μg/μL) to inhibit its mycelia growth. Phytochemicals analysis revealed that the extracts contained flavonoid, phenol and saponin. The methanol extracts of S. commune was then applied on the rubberwood blocks and found that the growth of P. sanguineus was inhibited effectively at 5.00 μg/μL.
The removal of heavy metals like lead, copper and cadmium from wastewater streams is an important environmental issue. The capability of immobilized Pycnoporus sanguineus (P. sanguineus), a white-rot macrofungi to remove heavy metals from aqueous solution in a packed bed column was investigated. Lead (Pb (II)) biosorption by immobilized cells of P. sanguineus was investigated in a packed bed column. The experiments were carried out by considering the effect of bed height (5-13 cm), flow rate (4-12 ml min-1) and initial lead (II) concentration (50-300 mg L-1). The breakthrough profiles showed that the saturation of metal ions was achieved faster for 5 cm bed height and 12 ml min-1 influent flow rate. However, the breakthrough time decreased as the initial metal concentration increased from 50 to 300 mg L-1. The column was regenerated using 0.1M HCl solution and biosorptiondesorption studies were carried out for 2 cycles. The results showed that the breakthrough time decreased as the number of cycle was proceeded.
Rubberwood is the most popular timber for furniture manufacturing industry in Malaysia. Major drawback concerned
that rubberwood is very prone to attack by fungi and wood borers, and the preservation method using boron compounds
exhibited hazardous effect to the workers. Fungal-based biological control agents have gained wide acceptance and
Schizophyllum commune secondary metabolite played an important role in term of antifungal agent productivity. The
effects of initial pH, incubation temperature and agitation on biomass production by S. commune were investigated
under submerged shake culture. In this work, it was found that the synthetic medium with initial solution pH of 6.5
and incubated at 30ºC with shaking at 150 rpm provided the highest biomass production. The biomass extract from
S. commune was then applied onto the rubberwood block panel to investigate its effectiveness. The results showed
that biomass extract at a concentration of 5 µg/µL could inhibit the growth of selected rubberwood-degrading fungi,
such as Lentinus sp., L. strigosus and Pycnoporus sanguineus.