Similar results concerning the effect of furfural on various soilborne fungi were reported.
However, not much can be found in the literature regarding the efficacy of furfural against fungi and bacteria, the metabolism and effects of furfural in eukaryotic cells have been investigated for yeast cells.
In this case, the conversion of furfural depends on the rate of oxidizing in yeasts.
Furfural is oxidized to furoic acid under aerobic conditions, and it is reduced to furfuryl alcohol in anaerobic fermentation . The authors indicated that when furfural was added to the culture medium, both cellulose and β-glucosidase activities decreased with increasing furfural concentration.
They added that activity of both enzymes decreased by 50% when concentration of furfural increased from 0 to 1.2 g/l (1200 ppm). More recently, El-Mougy et al.