Gamma Irradiation of Mushrooms and its Impact on Bioactive Components

Mushrooms are widely recognized as a high-nutritional food and are gaining popularity as a functional food. For vegetarians, mushrooms are the only natural source of vitamin D. Radiation is a novel and promising food processing technology. Irradiating mushrooms can be a safe and cost-effective way to increase shelf life while also ensuring hygienic and sensory quality. Mushrooms are well-known purposeful foods because of the presence of a large amount of nutraceutical components. These are well recognized as organic foods importance to high protein, low fat and low energy contents. These are made in minerals such as iron, phosphorus, also as in vitamins like riboflavin, thiamine, ergosterol, niacin, and ascorbic acid. They also contain bioactive constituents like secondary metabolites (terpenoids, acids, alkaloids, sesquiterpenes, polyphenolic compounds, lactones, sterols, ester analogues, vitamins, and metal chelating agents) and polysaccharides in the main -glucans and glycoproteins. Since, the incidences of biologically active substances like hepatoprotective, immune-potentiating, anti-cancer, antiviral, hypocholesterolemic agents and natural antioxidants helpful in reducing aerophilous damages. However, mushrooms remained underutilized, despite their wide organic process and bioactive potential [1,2,3]. Novel inexperienced techniques are being explored for the extraction of bioactive elements from edible mushrooms. Main objectives of the study were to know the impact of gamma irradiation, shelf life and bioactive components of mushrooms. In the current study low dose of gamma irradiation i.e., 0.25 and 0.75 kGy was employed for mushrooms. Vitamin-D content was estimated in irradiated mushrooms at 0.75 kGy, was 3.92 g, at 0.25 kGy was, 1.44 g and 2.77 g non-irradiated mushrooms. Other bioactive components, such as antioxidant activity, were increased during storage, and irradiated mushrooms retained more vitamin C and folic acid than non-irradiated mushrooms. The gamma irradiation process increases the bioavailability of vitamin-D, making it a good source of vitamin-D while also extending the shelf life of the mushroom. Gamma irradiation boosts vitamin D levels in mushrooms by converting endogenous ergosterol to ergocalciferol (Vitamin D2).