[Nhcoll-l] Mold curiosity

[Minnaert-Grote, Jamie]

Many herbaria that have cryptogamic collections include various molds (fungal and the odd balls like slime molds or water molds). We at ILLS/ILL have several molds deposited that are considered a danger to artifacts or various types of collections. In our collection, fungi, including molds, are generally dehydrated. I manage the plants and fungi but I'm a botanist and rely on our director, who is a mycologist, to answer the more detailed questions. Someone can correct me if I'm wrong about the process.

I can't speak to the food service industry, but for agriculture, many of these same species are also found on crops. For instance, both Aspergillus flavus and Cladosporium herbarum were frequently collected on corn and wheat. I did a quick search in Mycoportal for Aspergillus halophilicus, one of the molds found on DaVinci's portrait, and it looks like there are a handful of collections that do have specimens. At the one I looked at, it was collected on wheat.

Jamie Minnaert (she/her)
Collections Manager for INHS & University Herbarium & Fungarium Collections

University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Vice Chancellor Research Institutes
Illinois Natural History Survey
Herbarium

Mailing Address
1816 S. Oak St. | M/C 652
Champaign, IL 61820

Herbarium and office location
1909 S. Oak St. #2028
Champaign, IL 61820

minnaert at illinois.edu<mailto:minnaert at illinois.edu>
www.inhs.illinois.edu<http://www.inhs.illinois.edu/>

[University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign home]<http://illinois.edu/>

Under the Illinois Freedom of Information Act any written communication to or from university employees regarding university business is a public record and may be subject to public disclosure.

________________________________
From: Nhcoll-l <nhcoll-l-bounces at mailman.yale.edu> on behalf of Douglas Yanega <dyanega at gmail.com>
Sent: Friday, January 30, 2026 4:30 PM
To: nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu <nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu>
Subject: Re: [Nhcoll-l] Mold curiosity

On 1/30/26 1:49 PM, Minnaert-Grote, Jamie wrote:
I'd be interested to hear if anyone is vouchering the molds. This could be a really cool research subject for grad students if vouchers were available.


We had a serious problem recently in one of our cold rooms with mold, where it was growing on metal, plastic, and wood. No one had ever recalled this happening before. Your idea is a good one, but forgive me for asking: how exactly does one create an archival-quality voucher sample of a mold?


Parallel question: wouldn't a mold that thrives in freezers be a global catastrophe for the food service industry? Have they not encountered this yet?


Peace,

--
Doug Yanega      Dept. of Entomology       Entomology Research Museum
Univ. of California, Riverside, CA 92521-0314    phone: 951-827-4315
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