For optimal recovery of fungal pathogen, a battery of media should be used, and the followings are recommended:

Media with or without cyclohexamide (Cycloheximide is added to inhibit the growth of rapidly growing contaminating molds.)

Media with or without an antibacterial agent (Chloramphenicol, Gentamicin and Ciprofloxacin are commonly used antibacterial for this purpose).

Antibacterial agents are used to kill the contaminating bacterial species. If the sample is taken from sterile site, it is not necessary to use media containing antibacterial agents.

Brain-heart infusion (BHI) agar: It is a non-selective fungal culture medium that permits the growth of virtually all clinically relevant fungi. It is used for the primary recovery of saprophytic and dimorphic fungi

Czapek’s agar: It is used for the subculture of Aspergillus species for their differential diagnosis.

Inhibitory mold agar (IMA): Primary recovery of dimorphic pathogenic fungi. Saprophytic fungi and dermatophytes will not be recovered.

Mycosel/Mycobiotic agar:

It is generally Sabouraud’s dextrose agar with cycloheximide and chloramphenicol added.

It is used for the primary recovery of dermatophytes.

Niger Seed Agar: It is used for the identification of Cryptococcus neoformans.

Potato Dextrose Agar (PDA): It is a relatively rich medium for growing a wide range of fungi.

Sabouraud’s Heart Infusion (SABHI) agar: Primary recovery of saprophytic and dimorphic fungi, particularly fastidious strains.

Penicillium notatum on Sabouraud agar Image source: ASM

Penicillium notatum on Sabouraud agar

Image source: ASM

Sabouraud’s dextrose agar (SDA):

Sabouraud’s agar is sufficient for the recovery of dermatophytes from cutaneous samples and yeasts from vaginal cultures.

Not recommended as a primary isolation medium because it is insufficiently rich to recover certain fastidious pathogenic species, particularly most of the dimorphic fungi.

Sabouraud’s dextrose agar (2%) is most useful as a medium for the subculture of fungi recovered on enriched medium to enhance typical sporulation and provide the more characteristic colony morphology.

Potato flake agar: Primary recovery of saprophytic and dimorphic fungi, particularly fastidious and slow growing strains.

Further reading and sources: For more information please read the books:

Koneman’s color atlas and textbook of diagnostic microbiology and

Bailey and Scott’s Diagnostic Microbiology.

PDA medium is useful for saprofitic fungi subculture but adequate medium for isolation depend the nature of fungi for example Komada medium for isolation of Fusarium .....

For testing enzymatic activity , liquid medium is better and also differ according to nature of the test

Hello Francisco. Potato dextrose agar is alright for isolation but for enzyme activity, the safest thing to do is develop a mineral salts medium (basal medium) supplemented with the appropriate substrate for the enzyme you are interested in, preferably first in solid medium. The mere ability of the organism to use the substrate as sole source of carbon and energy indicates the ability to elaborate the corresponding enzyme. Using liquid medium and trying to detect the presence of micro-quantities of the protein (enzyme) using either Bradford or Lowry method should also follow naturally. enzyme recovery and purification should then follow before activity studies.

I agree with @Maurice Ekpenyong

I wish you good luck.

Thanks Hayat Essalmani for your response! Especifically, I want to isolate dung fungi...

Best,

Francisco.

Hello Maurice Ekpenyong! Thanks for your response, very good!

Francisco.

I suppose the most suitable for saprophytic fungi is the Sabouraud’s Heart Infusion (SABHI) agar.

Please see the following link:

https://microbeonline.com/common-fungal-culture-media-uses/

Best regards

Vit

For optimal recovery of fungal pathogen, a battery of media should be used, and the followings are recommended:

Media with or without cyclohexamide (Cycloheximide is added to inhibit the growth of rapidly growing contaminating molds.)

Media with or without an antibacterial agent (Chloramphenicol, Gentamicin and Ciprofloxacin are commonly used antibacterial for this purpose).

Antibacterial agents are used to kill the contaminating bacterial species. If the sample is taken from sterile site, it is not necessary to use media containing antibacterial agents.

Brain-heart infusion (BHI) agar: It is a non-selective fungal culture medium that permits the growth of virtually all clinically relevant fungi. It is used for the primary recovery of saprophytic and dimorphic fungi

Czapek’s agar: It is used for the subculture of Aspergillus species for their differential diagnosis.

Inhibitory mold agar (IMA): Primary recovery of dimorphic pathogenic fungi. Saprophytic fungi and dermatophytes will not be recovered.

Mycosel/Mycobiotic agar:

It is generally Sabouraud’s dextrose agar with cycloheximide and chloramphenicol added.

It is used for the primary recovery of dermatophytes.

Niger Seed Agar: It is used for the identification of Cryptococcus neoformans.

Potato Dextrose Agar (PDA): It is a relatively rich medium for growing a wide range of fungi.

Sabouraud’s Heart Infusion (SABHI) agar: Primary recovery of saprophytic and dimorphic fungi, particularly fastidious strains.

Penicillium notatum on Sabouraud agar Image source: ASM

Penicillium notatum on Sabouraud agar

Image source: ASM

Sabouraud’s dextrose agar (SDA):

Sabouraud’s agar is sufficient for the recovery of dermatophytes from cutaneous samples and yeasts from vaginal cultures.

Not recommended as a primary isolation medium because it is insufficiently rich to recover certain fastidious pathogenic species, particularly most of the dimorphic fungi.

Sabouraud’s dextrose agar (2%) is most useful as a medium for the subculture of fungi recovered on enriched medium to enhance typical sporulation and provide the more characteristic colony morphology.

Potato flake agar: Primary recovery of saprophytic and dimorphic fungi, particularly fastidious and slow growing strains.

Further reading and sources: For more information please read the books:

Koneman’s color atlas and textbook of diagnostic microbiology and

Bailey and Scott’s Diagnostic Microbiology.

Dear Khulood Obaid, thanks for your contribution!

FJSC.

Thank you and you dear Francisco

This is not that complicated. For the great range of fungi, Sabouraud agar is adequate as is Potato dextrose agar. If you'd like a defined medium - Czapek Dox as a base works well enough and also, with appropriate supplements, for xerophilic fungi.

Use antibiotic supplements only if you need them to isolate fungi from mixed cultures. Once you have a pure culture - they are not needed.

Can you tell us more bout your research?

https://microbeonline.com/common-fungal-culture-media-uses/

Hi

Yes, the PDA medium is suitable for most of the saprophytic fungi and you can use it.

If you want to assess enzymes activity, it is better to add some materials to the medium according to enzyme type that you need to assess, for example, for assessment of Chitinase activity, you have to add an amount of colloidal chitin in the PDA or other regular media.

Good luck

Potato dextrose agar(PDA) best medium for saprophytic fungi, and broth medium is used for testing enzymatic activity......good luck.

Thanks for your response, Alaa Kazim!

FJSC.

Good luck Francisco Calaca

Dear Francisco,

We are working on fungi since 1973 and isolated various types of fungi (opportunistic,dermatophytes) from different sources.A number of media, including Sabouraud dextrose agar, Potato dextrose agar, Pal sunflower seed medium, and APRM (Anubha, Pratibha, Raj , Mahendra) agar, are used to isolate various fungi form clinical and environmental samples.The later two media were developed by us in 1980, and 2015, respectively. Both media are very cheap, and easy to prepare.I am mostly using Pal sunflower seed medium since 1980. We have also developed two stains, namely PHOL (Pal, Hasegawa, Ono,Lee) and Narayan to study detailed morphology of fungal isolates recovered from clinical and saprobic materials.I have authored one book entitled " Veterinary and Medical Mycology,which gives composition of several media. Our media and stains are used by several scientists working in the field of mycology.We have uploaded over 400 papers on Academia and Research Gate.If you have interest in mycology, you may please download our papers.

I advise you to use our Pal sunflower seed medium and inform us your observations.

My email is: [email protected]

With best wishes and good luck,

Prof.Dr.Mahendra Pal

Founder Director of Narayan Consultancy, Anand, India

Hi ,,I use (PDA ,SDA )

But I am trying to growth fungi on manufactured culture media from environmental waste and have succeeded

See link..

Article Preparation of culture media for growth Trichoderma Harizanu...

Saba - I read the paper. Why did you use molasses rather than dextrose as in the comparative PDA medium?

We have recovered many saprophytic fungi from soil, pigeon droppings, bat guano, litter, fruits, vegetables, woods, water, air, pea nuts, rice husk etc.on Pal sunflower seed medium, which was developed by us in 1980.This medium is cheaper than Sabouraud dextrose medium.You can try our medium and inform me about the results.

Wishing you best of luck,

Prof.Dr.Maahendra Pal

Founder Director of Narayan Consultancy of Veterinary Public Health

Sabouraud dextrose agar with Cycloheximide is a good culture medium to grow pathogenic fungi in lab