CANANDAIGUA, N.Y. — Finger Lakes Community College student Paul Kuehernt is busy in a lab doing what he calls "cooking mushrooms."

These experiments are part of his class, working with Professor Jim Hewlett and growing mycelium. 

Mycelium can be described as fibers that extend below mushroom caps into rotting logs. Kuehernt and his class are testing the best ways to grow mycelium sustainably. 

“We have four different treatments we’re trying out today, so all four flasks will be a little different," said Hewlett.

The research is part of a competition funded by BioMADE, a U.S. Department of Defense institute. It's working with the college to find solutions to develop solutions for food scarcity and improve supply chain issues. 

FLCC is one of seven colleges selected for the competition and the only community college selected. FLCC was awarded $100,000 to develop this solution. 

Mycelium is high in nutrients. Once students find a way to grow it, the next step is finding a way to mass produce it for easy transportation. 

“If you had disaster relief, areas with food scarcity, you could deploy tech where you could grow mycelium in large quantities as a nutrition source," said Hewlett. 

Even if the mycelium project doesn’t win the competition, Kuehnert says the work he’s doing on this project is invaluable. 

“The actual experience I’m gaining in the lab with FLCC is going to be able to make my resume stand out," said Kuehnert. 

In the next step of the project, these FLCC students will work with a team from the National Corn-to-Ethanol Research Center at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville. Together they will work on finding a cheap and widely available food source for the mushroom mycelium to convert into nutrients for humans.