New species of white truffle discovered by Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Tuber belongs to the order Pezizales and Tuberaceae. It is a famous wild edible fungus. Among them, the white truffles from Italy and the black spore truffles from France are the most expensive. The international retail price of the former is about RMB 25,000 to 55,000. /Kg, known as diamonds in the kitchen, underground gold, etc. Because it grows underground and relies on pigs, rats, rabbits and other mammals to spread it, it is often referred to as "swine arch fungus" by people all over the southwest of my country, and it is mostly called truffle in business.

my country's truffle resources are rich, and the number of species accounts for one-third of the world's top, mainly distributed in the southwest mountainous area. So far, more than 70 species of truffles have been discovered in my country, of which more than 40 species have been reported in Yunnan, all of which are endemic to China. Based on a large number of field surveys, specimen collection, morphological anatomy and phylogenetic studies, the Yu Fuqiang Special Task Group of Kunming Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, has recently discovered 2 new species in Yunnan after the 11 new species of generalized truffles previously published. Species: Tuber songlu and Tuber qujingense, both of which belong to the Tuber genus Puberulum group, that is, "white truffle" in a narrow sense, and both have certain edible and economic value.

The discovery of this new species once again proves that Yunnan, as one of the world's species diversity hot spots, is a key area for studying the species formation and diversity differentiation of Truffles. This research also provides basic scientific data for diversity assessment, resource conservation and sustainable utilization of truffles.

From the perspective of most new species of truffles that have been published, they have obvious fragmentation and sporadic distribution, special habitats, and strong host plant specificity, and they mainly rely on small rodents for transmission and diffusion; these rare species are on the market It is often mixed and sold in bulk truffles, and most of them are immature, which seriously threatens their survival and reproduction. In the past 20 years or so, with large-scale commercial acquisitions and unscientific mining, the truffle habitat has been greatly destroyed, and the production of local truffles has shown a significant decline, and most species are in vulnerable or endangered situations. Even some species may have been destroyed and extinct before they have been discovered. The researchers suggest that relevant departments include more economically valuable truffles (in a broad sense) as protected species as soon as possible, and carry out research on rescue resource surveys and uations and germplasm collection and preservation to protect this unique biological and livelihood resource in southwest my country The sustainable use of.