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The blueprint for a better building may be hiding beneath the forest floor.

To design sustainable, weather-resistant structures, is studying the fungal networks that span thousands of acres underground—among the most expansive living organisms on Earth.

Mycelium is the fiber network behind fast-growing mushroom colonies that can span miles. Its underground strands connect to transfer water, nutrients and minerals, helping mushrooms grow and eventually emerge aboveground.

Qin’s research explores how these natural fibers can be harvested, grown and engineered into high-performing materials that could reshape how we construct buildings for generations to come.

“We focus on how these mycelium fibers grow and flourish and how those fibers can be used to replace a lot of the synthetic polymers,” says Qin, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering in the . “We then apply that knowledge to the fundamental mechanics behind designing the internal structures of buildings to make them lighter, stronger and more resistant to dynamic forces like impact from earthquakes.”

From the Forest Floor to the Laboratory

Qin’s team begins its work at the most fundamental level, with a single spore. Researchers introduce mushroom spores into a carefully prepared growing medium then use time-lapse imaging to monitor how the fibers grow, branch and connect.

By adjusting such environmental conditions as humidity, temperature and substrate stiffness, the group can influence how quickly and densely the mycelium network develops.

Once the network reaches maturity, it becomes a natural adhesive.

When introduced to biomass materials like wood chips or sawdust, mycelium fibers grow into the gaps between particles and bind everything together, functioning like a biological version of wood glue without any synthetic chemicals.

“The beautiful thing is you don’t need to use glue or any synthetic adhesive,” Qin says. “Instead, you just use this natural fiber system to bind biomass together, and it spontaneously grows.”

The result is a material that resembles medium-density fiberboard but is produced entirely from natural components.

Qin calls the bonding process “biowelding,” a technique that effectively joins wood components the way welding joins steel, but without heat, chemicals or combustion risk.

To optimize the recipe for these composite materials, Qin’s lab uses artificial intelligence. Because biomass sources vary widely in particle size and chemical composition, no single equation can reliably predict the best combination of pressure, temperature and material inputs.

Instead, the team runs large-scale experiments and uses machine learning tools to identify which variables produce the lightest, strongest and most durable results.

“Using machine learning and AI is a very powerful tool that helps us understand these complex systems and figure out the correlation between this complex structure and the performance of the materials in that structure,” Qin says.

A Greener Way to Insulate

One of the most promising applications of Qin’s research involves building insulation, and Qin has discovered that mycelium insulation avoids many of the traditional negatives associated with current insulation options like fiberglass, cellulose and polystyrene.

Mycelium comes from a renewable source that is petroleum-free and possesses a much smaller carbon footprint than other insulation choices. Qin’s research has also shown that mycelium provides effective insulation while allowing the building to breathe.

“It’s a sustainable source, a green material,” Qin says. “It’s also safer and cheaper for scaled manufacturing purposes.”

In collaboration with mechanical and aerospace engineering colleagues and and Nina Sharifi, a professor in the School of Architecture, Qin is developing mycelium-based insulation panels specifically designed for building retrofits, targeting older houses across New York state that have proven to be energy inefficient.

Filtering the Air We Breathe

When Qin arrived at Syracuse University from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he created the , a research group studying biomechanics and biomaterials to improve the efficiency and performance of building materials.

His research earned Qin a in 2022. But in the beginning, while Qin recognized the benefits of using mycelium as an adhesive, he didn’t realize the mushroom’s unique network structure could also address air filtration challenges.

Working with Zhang and mechanical and aerospace engineering colleague , Qin’s lab is now exploring how mycelium materials can be integrated into heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems to capture airborne particles and absorb chemical gases that slowly release from synthetic wood products, furniture and paint.

“Once we start to collect samples and put them in the microscope, we see this unique complex network structure,” Qin says. “Once we do the mechanical testing, we see how this complex network connects to the mechanical, thermal and many material responses. At that point, we start to explore many different applications.”

This work is supported by a Center of Excellence faculty fellowship Qin received last year.

Qin credits the NSF CAREER grant with allowing his team of student researchers to spend four years exploring mycelium’s potential.

“We knew mycelium can be used as an adhesive, but we knew much less about the insulation or the air filtering implications,” Qin says. “The NSF CAREER grant really allowed us to explore the fundamental scientific applications found in mycelium while discovering all of the related applications. It was a game changer.”