Jiahuai (Alex) Hu (WPDN)
The Communicator: Volume 5, Issue 5, May 2024
The Thrive and Grow farms grows fresh produce for its customers, including sunflowers and peas, as microgreens. The Founder of Thrive and Grow farms, Michael Ismail, had noted that an occasional seed had fungal growth. But more recently, the widespread nature of the growth alarmed an employee into further action.
Fig. 1. Fungal growth on germinating sunflower seeds in a restaurant in the Phoenix metropolitan area in Arizona
They reached out to my diagnostic lab at the School of Plant Sciences, University of Arizona in Tucson for help. Some trays of seedlings had sprouted with two distinct fungal growths. The seedlings were to be used in a microgreen operation and they were worried that the fungi growing alongside the plants could be potentially hazardous to employees and customers.
We used two methods of identification: plating fungal samples to try to determine the identity of the fungus through morphological characteristics; and processing the pure fungal culture through DNA isolation (DNeasy Plant Pro kit) and PCR amplification. The isolated DNA samples were sent for DNA sequencing, and the results came back positive for Aspergillus flavus, a known source of aflatoxin that would indeed have been dangerous to the health of those who consume the microgreens. We promptly contacted Thrive and Grow farms with the results. Mr. Ismail took action and commented: “Last week we destroyed the entire crop. Thank you so much for your help with this.” He also became more aware of potential future fungal infections going forward.
Fungal detection is important for the health and safety of the community through monitoring fresh-grown produce for pathogenic infections that could produce toxic secondary metabolites. My lab was proud of being able to help this client.
