The influence of selenium on selected heavy metals cumulation in Oyster mushroom fruiting bodies

Food safety is a very frequent topic. The article deals with the problems of fortification of the most grown mushroom in Slovakia, and the 3rd most grown mushroom in the world, Pleurotus ostreatus. Due to the high environmental pollution of soils and air, there is a risk of the production of dangerous fruiting bodies with high heavy metals content. It is known that these substances can promote serious health effects on human body, such as bone weakness or kidney damages (cadmium) and negative process of cognitive developing (lead). The experiment was focused on biofortification with selenium to reduce the accumulation of selected heavy metals (lead, cadmium) in oyster mushroom, grown with intensive cultivation under artificial conditions. This work confirms that the application of sodium selenate to the growing substrate with straw as the main component can reduce the accumulation of cadmium (by 22.45%) and lead (by 64.81%). Research by various authors reported the ability of the oyster mushroom to embed selenium from the substrate into the fruiting bodies. Based on the results of the experiments, we propose to fortify the growing substrate for the production of oyster mushroom by selenium. This way we produce a food with a high antioxidant potential.