ABSTRACT
Commercial and marketing pressures have been important driving forces in the development and expansion of the established areas of fungal biotechnology. Central to the improvement of a fermentation process, be it the production of an antibiotic in a liquid system or a solid state system such as used in mushroom production, has been the improvement of the organism. Traditionally in the fermentation industry this has been based on mutation and selection of improved strains; breeding techniques involving recombination have been less important. In mushroom production the very opposite is the case, as the product itself represents the climax of sexual development and recombination through meiosis provides the most opportunity to develop new strains.
