Mycelium-based composites (MBCs) are an emerging category of cost-effective and environmentally sustainable materials that are attracting significant research and commercial interest across various industries, including construction, manufacturing, agriculture, and biomedicine. These materials harness the natural growth of fungi as a low-energy bio-fabrication method, converting abundant agricultural by-products and waste into sustainable alternatives to energy-intensive synthetic construction materials. Their affordability and eco-friendly characteristics make them attractive for both research and commercialisation. Currently, mycelium-based foams and sandwich composites are being actively developed for applications in construction. These materials offer exceptional thermal insulation, excellent acoustic absorption, and superior fire safety compared to conventional building materials like synthetic foams and engineered wood. As a result, MBCs show great potential for applications in thermal and acoustic insulation. However, their foam-like mechanical properties, high water absorption, and limited documentation of material properties restrict their use to non- or semi-structural roles, such as insulation, panelling, and furniture. This paper presents a comprehensive review of the fabrication process and the factors affecting the production and performance properties of MBCs. It addresses key elements such as fungal species selection, substrate choice, optimal growth conditions, dehydration methods, post-processing techniques, mechanical and physical properties, termite resistance, cost comparison, and life cycle assessment.

Mycelium-based composites (MBC) are an emerging category of cost-effective and environmentally sustainable materials that are attracting significant research and commercial interest across various industries, including construction, manufacturing, agriculture, and biomedicine. These materials harness the natural growth of fungi as a low-energy bio-fabrication method, converting abundant agricultural by-products and waste into sustainable alternatives to energy-intensive synthetic construction materials. Their affordability and eco-friendly characteristics make them attractive for both research and commercialisation. Currently, mycelium-based foams and sandwich composites are being actively developed for applications in construction. These materials offer exceptional thermal insulation, excellent acoustic absorption, and superior fire safety compared to conventional building materials like synthetic foams and engineered wood. As a result, MBC show great potential for applications in thermal and acoustic insulation. However, their foam-like mechanical properties, high water absorption, and limited documentation of material properties restrict their use to non- or semi-structural roles, such as insulation, panelling, and furniture. This paper presents a comprehensive review of the fabrication process and the factors affecting the production and performance properties of MBC. It addresses key elements such as fungal species selection, substrate choice, optimal growth conditions, dehydration methods, post-processing techniques, mechanical and physical properties, termite resistance, cost comparison, and life cycle assessment.

This study evaluates the efficacy of orange peel powder (OP), a readily available agri-food waste, and its muffle furnace char (MF) and nitrogen-assisted char (NA), for crystal violet (CV) adsorption. Char samples analyzed using thermogravimetric analysis, Fourier-transform infrared spectrometry, scanning electron microscopy, and proximate analysis showed substantial structural changes. The impacts on absorption of pH, adsorbent, contact time, dye concentration, and temperature were evaluated. Orange peel powder showed maximum adsorption capacity (49.35 mg g^–1, Langmuir isotherm), compared to those of MF (19.05 mg g^–1) and NA (12.87 mg g^–1), due to its abundant surface sites and functional groups. Enhanced pH tolerance and process stability and other parameters were exhibited by MF and NA but with reduced adsorption capacity for CV. All adsorbents conformed to the Langmuir isotherm and exhibited pseudo-second order kinetics, indicative of monolayer chemisorption. Crystal violet adsorption on OP was exothermic and spontaneous at ambient temperature, while MF and NA exhibited endothermic and temperature-dependent behavior. Although orange peel exhibited superior adsorption capacity, chars have practical benefits for effective dye removal, facilitating waste valorization and sustainable water management.

Rice husk, a globally abundant rice-milling by-product, is frequently burnt or landfilled and underexploited for valorization into low-cost adsorbents. Converting such agricultural residues into carbonaceous materials supports a circular economy and offers a green alternative to energy- and reagent-intensive activated carbon for removing cationic pollutants. In this work, rice husk was valorized into two chars using muffle-furnace (MFRH) and nitrogen-assisted (NARH) pyrolysis and benchmarked against raw husk (RH) for removal of crystal violet, a model cationic dye. A face-centered central composite design (FCCCD) coupled with response surface method (RSM) was used to model and optimize the process across a pH range (4–10), adsorbent dose (1–9 g·L⁻¹), and CV concentration (10–200 mg·L⁻¹) for each material. Quadratic modelling showed high goodness of fit for all adsorbents (R² = 0.97–0.99), closely reproducing experimental removals and confirming the suitability of the prediction. Although removal increased with pH and dose for all three materials, the magnitude and curvature of these effects differed markedly between raw and pyrolyzed husk. Raw husk outperformed both chars across most of the design space despite a lower surface area, due to diminished active sites on carbonized material, and the chars exceeded it only under optimized alkaline, high-dose conditions. Numerical optimization identified distinct conditions for each adsorbent, where experimental removals of 96.32% (RH), 98.37% (MFRH), and 99.66% (NARH) were obtained, which are in close agreement with model predictions. These findings show that RSM–CCD can be used to both optimize operating conditions and quantitatively compare rice-husk-derived adsorbents prepared under different pyrolysis conditions.