Screening fungal strains isolated from a limestone cave on their ability to grow and precipitate CaCO 3 in an environment relevant to concrete

Aurélie Van Wylick; Simon Vandersanden; Karl Jonckheere; Hubert Rahier; Lars De Laet; Eveline Peeters

doi:10.17912/micropub.biology.000764

Screening fungal strains isolated from a limestone cave on their ability to grow and precipitate CaCO ₃ in an environment relevant to concrete

MicroPubl Biol. 2023 May 3:2023:10.17912/micropub.biology.000764. doi: 10.17912/micropub.biology.000764. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Aurélie Van Wylick^#^{1

2

3}, Simon Vandersanden^#^{1

4}, Karl Jonckheere¹, Hubert Rahier², Lars De Laet³, Eveline Peeters¹

Affiliations

¹ Research Group of Microbiology, Department of Bioengineering Sciences, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Brussels Capital, Belgium.
² Research Group of Physical Chemistry and Polymer Science, Department of Materials and Chemistry, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Brussels Capital, Belgium.
³ Research Group of Architectural Engineering, Department of Architectural Engineering, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Brussels Capital, Belgium.
⁴ Current Address: Centre for Environmental Sciences, Hasselt University, Hasselt, Flanders, Belgium.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Fungi-mediated self-healing concrete is a novel approach that promotes the precipitation of calcium carbonate (CaCO ₃ ) on fungal hyphae to heal the cracks in concrete. In this study, we set out to explore the potential of fungal species isolated from a limestone cave by investigating their ability to precipitate CaCO ₃ and to survive and grow in conditions relevant to concrete. Isolated strains belonging to the genera Botryotrichum sp. , Trichoderma sp. and Mortierella sp. proved to be promising candidates for fungi-mediated self-healing concrete attributed to their growth properties and CaCO ₃ precipitation capabilities in the presence of cement.

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the Vrije Universiteit Brussel and funded by Research Foundation Flanders (FWO-Vlaanderen) [FWO-SB PhD fellowships to Aurélie Van Wylick (Grant Number 1SA9721N)].