Fungal Biodiversity of a Library and Cellulolytic Activity of Some Fungi

Fungal spore incidence inside Gandhi Gyan library of Wardha city was recorded by exposing potato dextrose agar and Czapek Dox agar culture media petri plates for 10 minutes and then incubated at 28 +/- 1 degrees for 4-5 days. The plates were regularly examined. Number of fungal colonies was recorded from the library for 6 months in the year 2011. Among the various species encountered Aspergillus niger, Asparagus fumigatus were the predominant fungi in the library. Investigations using the petri plate exposure culture plate method helped in determining the occurrence of fungal species in the air inside the selected library, which also causes allergic diseases to human beings working therein. The fungi were also isolated from highly damaged, old and unreadable books. The cellulolytic activity and damage of library materials by some common airborne fungi were studied. The present investigation dealt with the isolation of fungal species from indoor environment of library, identification of cellulose-degrading fungal species from library books and evaluation of cellulolytic capabilities, based on loss in weight of newspaper and book paper discs.