Filamentous Fungi Biorefinery, the latest release in the Current Developments in Biotechnology and Bioengineering series, builds on knowledge on the classification of filamentous fungi and presence and roles played in ecosystems. The importance of filamentous fungi is then further corroborated through a description of their present applications in biotechnological processes. Knowledge on fungal biology is extended through discussion on structure and composition together with a description of growth potentialities of filamentous fungi in/on a wide range of substrates. In addition, the morphology of filamentous fungi is then described and its implications during integration in industrial processes is discussed.
The book then provides an overview on the use of filamentous fungi for the production of a wide range of value-added products, including feed and food products, alcohols, organic acids, pigments, enzymes, antibiotics and biopolymers. All provided state-of-arts are extended to a description of the present degree of application of filamentous fungi towards the production of those products using low-value substrates, identification of research gaps, and proposes future research avenues.