State of the art, recent advances, and challenges in the field of fungal mycelium materials: a snapshot of the 2021 Mini Meeting.

Material development based on fungal mycelium is a fast-rising field of study as researchers, industry, and society actively search for new sustainable materials to address contemporary material challenges. The compelling potential of fungal mycelium materials is currently being explored in relation to various applications, including construction, packaging, "meatless" meat, and leather-like textiles. Here, we highlight the discussions and outcomes from a recent 1-day conference on the topic of fungal mycelium materials ("Fungal Mycelium Materials Mini Meeting"), where a group of researchers from diverse academic disciplines met to discuss the current state of the art, their visions for the future of the material, and thoughts on the challenges surrounding widescale implementation.

A fungal mycelium templates the growth of aragonite needles.

Fungi live within diverse environments and survive well under extreme conditions that are usually beyond the tolerance of most other organisms. In different environments fungi are known to induce precipitation of a wide range of minerals. Various species of fungi have been shown to facilitate calcium carbonate mineralization.

Surface reconstruction causes structural variations in nanometric amorphous AlO.

The physical properties of nanocrystalline materials are known to be size dependent, owing to surface effects. Theoretically, a similar effect should also exist in amorphous materials. To examine this possibility, we carried out a study in which amorphous thin films of aluminum oxide were produced by atomic layer deposition (ALD) and studied by X-ray Absorption Near Edge Structure Spectroscopy (XANES) in grazing incidence geometry, as a function of the grazing angle.