shows that the highest biomass level as determined by
glucosamine content, 17 mgglucosamine/gdry weight, was obtained by
using 0.28 mm average diameter particles and 5 g/L ammonium
sulfate in the nutrient solution. It should be noted that glucosamine
content increases in old cultivars, mainly due to the biomass
proportion represented by the chitin-containing cell wall (Sparringa
and Owens, 1999). Thus, the conversion factor between biomass
and glucosamine varies with age for many fungi. In this study, it
was used a conversion factor derived from the linear regression between
dry fungal cell mass, obtained by the overculture system
(Ikasari and Mitchell, 2000) at a time corresponding to the late
exponential growth phase of the microorganism (2 days), and the
glucosamine content.