Medicinal Mushrooms

Picture credit: Czech Wikipedia

Synonyms

Merulius aureus Fr.
Merulius croceus (Pers.) Duby
Merulius vastator Fr.
Plicatura aurea (Fr.) Parmasto
Serpula aurea (Fr.) P. Karst.
Xylomyzon croceum Pers.
Xylomyzon solare Pers.

Description

Fruit body: 5-15 cm broad, approximately 2 mm thick; a spreading, wrinkled crust on the underside of logs; bright orange to golden brown, paler yellow-gold at margin; surface extensively folded and wrinkled.
Spores: cylindrical, smooth; 3.5-4.5 x 1.0-2.0 µm.
Spore deposit: white to yellowish.
Habitat and habitat: on undersides of dead, bark-less conifer logs. Found in Europe and North America. August-October.
Edibility: Not edible.

Polysaccharides extracted from the mycelial culture of P. aureus and administered intraperitoneally into white mice at a dosage of 300 mg/kg inhibited the growth of Sarcoma 180 and Ehrlich solid cancers by 100% (Ohtsuka et al., 1973).

References

Ohtsuka S, Ueno S, Yoshikumi C, Hirose F, Ohmura Y, Wada T, Fujii T, Takahashi E.
Polysaccharides having an anticarcinogenic effect and a method of producing them from species of Basidiomycetes.
UK Patent 1331513, 26 September 1973.

 Last modified: 13-Aug-2008

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 27th, 2008 at 8:43 pm and is filed under Anti-tumor, Medicinal Effects. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.