Nutritional qualities and antioxidant activity of Pleurotus floridanus grown on composted peach sawdust substrate with different composting time.

Recently, composting cultivation method is widely used in oyster mushroom production. In this study, we focused on the effects of composting processes on nutritional qualities and antioxidant activity of Pleurotus floridanus mushroom fruiting bodies. Three treatments of different composting time (2, 4, and 5 days) were performed with an atmospheric sterilization treatment as the control. The results showed that the pH value, total carbon content, and total nitrogen content of substrate were critical parameters which would significantly affect mushroom qualities and bioactivities. Fruiting bodies of the control demonstrated significantly higher crude protein content, total amino acid content, and essential amino acid content than that of composting treatments. Moreover, fruiting bodies of treatment D4 and D5 manifested significantly higher crude polysaccharide contents. Crude polysaccharide of treatment D4 represented the highest scavenging ability toward both radical 3-ethylbenzthiazoline-6-sulfonic acid (ABTS·+ ) and Hydroxyl radical (OH·). It suggests that composting processes is suitable for oyster mushroom cultivation based on nutritional and antioxidant qualities of fruiting bodies.