"Cultured” fungi: fungal assemblages that affect cultural heritage in archives and libraries

The fungal assemblages that can develop on a piece of art are analogous to the communities of decomposers that,in natural environments,transform nutrients bound in dead organic matter into low molecular or inorganic forms, making them available to plants, but in man-made objects the result of fungal activity is discolouration and structural damage. A document supported on parchment, dated back to the XXcentury and finely illuminated was affected by moulds. This beautiful object belongs to the Memorial Museum of the Armed Forces in Rome and consists of the kind of document which used to accompany official flags on war-boats. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM), microanalysis and metabolic phenotyping were applied to study the ecology of fungi inhabiting this valuable object of art, and to describe the spoiling mechanisms of the materials by fungi.