ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews reports relating environmental parameters to the production of secondary metabolites. The model for secondary metabolite production in fungi seems to have arisen from single-celled organisms that might well differentiate exclusively as a population of cells, not as a multicellular organism, and the two cases must necessarily be different. Correlation between some measurable time-dependent changes in batch culture and some biochemical event or events is routinely give causal status; i.e., the appearance of a product is said to be caused by the disappearance of a nutrient. Many attempts at developing a single model and an adequate definition for special metabolism are available in the literature. Stress induced by the application of biocides does not, as a rule, enhance special metabolite production. Frequently fungi readily incorporate exogenously supplied intermediates or analogs into special metabolites, which implies a low enzyme specificity and a low degree of complexing in these biosynthetic pathways.
