Mushrooms can be a welcome addition to any dish. They offer an earthy flavour as well as a meaty texture to tickle our palates. But while mushrooms are great in cuisine, they also have other uses outside of the kitchen. On this week’s show, we explore some of the scientific uses of these edible fungi and how they may be able improve our lives.

For centuries, mushrooms have been regarded as medicines in several cultures. Our first guest is working to merge the modern with the ancient. His name is Chow Lee and he is a professor at the University of Northern British Columbia. He is trying to find chemicals in mushroom varieties that may help to treat a disease that has spanned the ages, cancer. We learn more about his work and also his belief that we can learn from traditional medicine to develop modern day cures.   

Apart from being used for cures, some mushrooms are known for their ability to cause hallucinations. These “magic mushrooms” are known to contain a chemical known as psilocybin. There’s been an interest in this chemical for use in mental health as it seems to be helping people who suffer from migrains, anxiety and depression. Our next guest has been looking at the function of this chemical in nature and how it has spread across the mushroom landscape. Her name is Hannah Reynolds and she is an assistant professor at Western Connecticut State University. She has found that this chemical may be harnessed for mass production so that we can test it for its medicinal value. 

In our SASS Class, we look at how mushrooms can help us live better. Our guest teacher is Robert Beelman, who is the Director of the Center for Plant and Mushroom Foods For Health at Penn State University. He’ll take us through some of the chemicals that can sustain our health and introduce us to one called ergothioneine that might eventually be used to give us a chance to live longer. 

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Twitter: @JATetro
Email: [email protected]

Guests:

Chow Lee
Web: https://www.unbc.ca/chow-lee

Hannah Reynolds
Web: http://wcsu.edu/biology/surf/faculty-mentors/reynolds/
Twitter: @hreynolds_fungi

Robert Beelman
Web: https://foodscience.psu.edu/directory/rbb6

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