Fungi: From Molecular Biology to Biotechnology Applications
A special issue of International Journal of Molecular Sciences (ISSN 1422-0067). This special issue belongs to the section "Molecular Microbiology".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 September 2026 | Viewed by 97
Special Issue Editors
Interests: fungal bioactive compounds; edible and medicinal fungi; fungal metabolism and secondary metabolites; fungal biodiversity; metabolomics of fungal natural products; nutraceuticals and functional foods from fungi; fungal ecology and interactions; sustainable biotechnological applications of fungi
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Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
We are pleased to invite you to contribute to a Special Issue of the International Journal of Molecular Sciences (section: Molecular Microbiology) titled “Fungi: From Molecular Biology to Biotechnology Applications”.
Fungal research has attracted renewed scientific interest, fueled by advances in molecular biology and the growing demand for sustainable bio-based resources. Contemporary omics approaches are revealing the remarkable complexity of fungal metabolism and elucidating new perspectives for exploring the fungal secondary metabolome. These developments increasingly position fungi as promising biological platforms for the discovery and production of structurally diverse bioactive compounds with potential applications in functional foods, nutraceuticals, and health-related biotechnology. In particular, edible and medicinal fungi are gaining attention as a still largely underexplored reservoir of metabolites whose biochemical diversity reflects the extraordinary ecological and evolutionary versatility of the fungal kingdom.
This Special Issue aims to bring together recent advances in fungal molecular biology and biotechnology that contribute to the discovery, characterization, and application of fungal-derived bioactive compounds relevant to nutraceutical and functional food development. This topic aligns with the scope of the International Journal of Molecular Sciences, particularly the section Bioactives and Nutraceuticals, by focusing on molecular mechanisms, metabolic diversity, and biotechnology-driven exploration of fungal bioactive compounds.
In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome. Research areas may include, but are not limited to:
- Molecular regulation of fungal metabolism and secondary metabolite biosynthesis;
- Omics-based exploration of the fungal secondary metabolome;
- Discovery and characterization of fungal-derived bioactive compounds;
- Edible and medicinal fungi as sources of nutraceutical ingredients;
- Fungal biotechnology for the production of functional food components;
- Metabolomics and molecular approaches for identifying bioactive metabolites;
- Biosynthetic pathways and regulation of fungal natural products;
- Biotechnological exploitation of fungi for nutraceutical and functional food development.
We look forward to receiving your contributions.
Dr. Ljiljana Janjušević
Dr. Ljiljana Šašić Zorić
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. International Journal of Molecular Sciences is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. There is an Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal. For details about the APC please see here. Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- fungi
- fungal secondary metabolome
- fungal bioactive compounds
- edible and medicinal fungi
- nutraceuticals
- functional foods
- fungal biotechnology
- metabolomics
- fungal natural products
- fungal metabolism
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