COMPARISON OF PSILOCYBE-CUBENSIS SPORE AND MYCELIUM ALLERGENS

Background: Basidiospores are an important cause of respiratory allerg y in mold-sensitive atopic subjects. Collection of the large amounts o f spores required for extract preparation is tedious and difficult. A destrable alternative could be mycelium grown in vitro if it is allerg enically similar to spores. Methods: Therefore this study compared the allergen contents of Psilocybe cubensis spore and mycelium extracts b y different techniques with the use of pooled sera from subjects who h ad skin test and RAST results that were positive to P. cubensis spores . Results: Isoelectric focusing immunoprints revealed six common IgE-b inding bands at isoelectric points 4.7, 5.0, 5.5, 5.6, 8.7, and 9.3. T wo additional bands at isoelectric points 3.9 and 5.7 were detected on ly in the spore extract. Sodium dodecylsulfate-polyacrylamide gel elec trophoresis immunoblots exhibited six common IgE-binding bands at 16, 35, 487, 52, 62, and 76 kd; 20 and 40 kd bands were present only in th e spore exact. Although RAST and isoelectric focusing inhibition demon strated that P. cubensis spore and mycelium extracts share many allerg ens, spores were allergenically more potent than mycelium. Conclusion: The results indicate that mycelium is a useful source of P. cubensis allergen, even though several spore allergens were not detected in myc elium.