LAUSR

Abstract Medicinal mushrooms are known for their bioactive molecules that have potential to fight cancer cell and have an immune-modulatory effect. Mainly these are either polysaccharide or terpenoidal molecules. In present study mushroom samples were explored for their exopolysaccharide (EPS) production as bioactive molecules. The potential EPS producer was identified as Ganoderma sp TV1 (GenBank accession no. KC590320). Conditions optimized for pH and temperature for higher EPS production suggest that 6.5 pH and 23°C were optimum. Antioxidant activity examined in the temporal sequence of event revealed that it shows higher on 7th day of incubation. Antioxidant activity from fruiting body and mycellial growth was examined and showed higher activity in fruiting body. Chemical characterization of EPS was done by TLC, FTIR, HPLC and XRD revealed glucose and galactose as monomer. EPS showed 50% inhibition of ABTS in antioxidant assay and 61.8% inhibition of A549 lung cancer cell line in MTT assay for anticancer assay. Thus, EPS by Ganoderma sp. TV1 can be effectively used as antioxidant and anticancer agent.