Toxic mushrooms kill more than 100 people each year and leave thousands more sick and full of regret for eating that random shroom in the forest.
But a new portable test, developed by the USDA Agricultural Research Service (ARS), could help save some of those lives.
The assessment can identify even the most miniscule presence of deadly toxin amanitin in about 10 minutes, based on a rice-grain-size sample of toadstool or the urine of someone who’s eaten a poisonous fungus.
“We developed the test primarily for mushrooms as food products. Serendipitously, it was sensitive enough to also detect the toxin in urine,” according to ARS microbiologist Candace Bever.
It also works with dog pee, which is great news for pet owners whose pup loves indiscriminately chewing on mushrooms.
“Our hope is that doctors and veterinarians will be able to quickly and confidently identify amatoxin poisoning rather than having to clinically eliminate other suspected gastrointestinal diseases first,” Bever, a member of the Foodborne Toxin Detection and Prevention Research Unit in California, said in a statement.
ARS also hopes its test—which does not yet expose compounds like hallucinogens or other impurities—could be a “practical and definitive” way for mushroom foragers to identify and avoid eating venomous plants.
If a commercial partner can be found to produce and market the kit.
“This test can provide more information about a wild mushroom beyond physical appearance and characteristics, and detect something we cannot even see—the presence of amanitins,” Bever said.
Scientists from the University of California-Davis, Pet Emergency and Specialty Center of Marin, and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also contributed to this project.
Their research was published in the journal Toxins.
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