Fleur Kleijburg

Fleur E. L. Kleijburg

The mushroom forming fungus Schizophyllum commune has been found on all continents including Antarctica (Dos Santos et al., 2020; Ohm et al., 2010a). It grows in natural and man-made environments such as forests and parks but also in the soil of the Chernobyl exclusion zone (Traxler et al., 2021). Also, it has been isolated in a deep coal bearing sediment 2 km below the seafloor (Zain Ul Arifeen et al., 2021). S. commune can be an opportunistic pathogen of plants, animals and humans, as well as a beneficial endophyte. However, S. commune mainly lives as a saprotroph with at least 150 genera of woody plants as a substrate (Cooke, 1961). As such, it contributes to nutrient recycling in nature. Some reports describe S. commune as an endophyte in a variety of plants. Data indicate that S. commune can protect the host plant against pathogenic bacteria (Sharma et al., 2024) and promote the production of active plant components (Xie et al., 2023), while it has also been related to antifeeding and insecticidal activity (Wang et al., 2022). The role of S. commune as a plant pathogen is disputed. Cook (1961) described it as a wound parasite or even a saprophyte. Indeed, it can be found on especially dead branches of living trees (Takemoto et al., 2010). Others do consider S. commune as a pathogen. The fungus causes wood rot on living trees including fruit and ornamental trees. The basidiospores of S. commune initiate infection from pruning wounds, freeze injuries and sunscald lesions and spread via living tissues of the host plants including bark and sapwood (Takemoto et al., 2010). Few infections of animals have been described in the literature. For instance, it was reported to cause bone inflammation in dogs (Mori et al., 2009; Tanaka et al., 2008) and infection of the eyes and the lung of a seal (Hanafusa et al., 2016). S. commune also rarely infects humans with only 71 reported cases in the