Sarcosphaera coronaria
investiganda
f. cul.
Sarcosphaera coronaria investiganda
investiganda: Owed an investigation. The species is on the Needs Investigation table because a question stands on its published record that the Key cannot read a verdict from: a poisoning reported and no molecule found, a molecule found and no sourced route, a mark in a source list, a molecule known from this one species and not yet confirmed. The name is the stem of its recorded molecule, where the record names one and decides it, then investiganda, and nothing after it while the row is open. Where the record names no molecule the name is investiganda alone, and the gap is deliberate. The Key reads molecules: it puts a molecule in a name only when a record has placed that molecule in the mushroom. A poisoning report is not such a record; it says that harm occurred, not what caused it. The molecule may well exist, and the word states that it is to be found, not a guess at what it will be. The species is not innocuus, because innocuus means that the published record carries no link to a toxic molecule, and this species is on the table because the question of such a link is open; it would be innocuus only once the question is closed in that direction. The species leaves the table, and the word, by a ruling: its molecule registered and read, or its record found to carry no molecule after all. Latin, the gerundive of investigare: to be investigated.
On Needs Investigation, Medicinal Use, The Complete Table.
GBIF: photographs, names and where it has been found.
Sources
| Li et al. 2021 | 3 reports of eating without harm Li H, Tian Y, Menolli N Jr, Ye L, Karunarathna SC, Perez-Moreno J, Rahman MM, Rashid MH, Phengsintham P, Rizal L, Kasuya T, Lim YW, Dutta AK, Khalid AN, Huyen LT, Balolong MP, Baruah G, Madawala S, Thongklang N, Hyde KD, Kirk PM, Xu J, Sheng J, Boa E, Mortimer PE (2021). Reviewing the world's edible mushroom species: a new evidence-based classification system. Comprehensive Reviews in Food Science and Food Safety 20: 1982-2014. Supplementary Table S1. link |
| Wu et al. 2026 | ‘药用(有毒)’ medicinal, possibly poisonous — entry 52, 冠裂肉球盘菌; marked 有毒: a lead, not a record Wu F, Liu SB, Wang XH, Zhang M, Yang ZL, Dai YC (2026). 中国食药用菌物种编目 [Species cataloging of edible and medicinal fungi in China]. 菌物学报 Mycosystema 45(1): 250237. link |
| Wu et al. 2019 | ‘E’ — Wu et al. 2019, Table 1, p. 43: E (edible) Wu F, Zhou L-W, Yang Z-L, Bau T, Li T-H, Dai Y-C (2019). Resource diversity of Chinese macrofungi: edible, medicinal and poisonous species. Fungal Diversity 98: 1-76. doi:10.1007/s13225-019-00432-7. Table 1, 'Medicinal fungi and their function(s)'. link |
Needs Investigation. Why it is here: The fruit body accumulates arsenic, mostly as methylarsonic acid, in every collection measured (153 to 7,090 mg/kg dry, Stijve 2009; up to 0.9% of dry mass, Braeuer et al. 2020), and the historical poisonings, one fatal (Courtételle 1920), were all salads, raw or only scalded. Open: is a dangerous level of arsenic uptake universal to the species, or only where the soil is laden with arsenic? (a published record). What would settle it: Find the paired data, fruit body against the soil it grew in, across sites: Stijve T 2009, Schweiz. Z. Pilzk. 87(1): 27-29 and 87(2): 69-71 (Courtételle soil 55-320 mg/kg; per-collection figures); Braeuer S et al. 2020, Sci. Total Environ. 736: 139524 (collection sites); Borovička J et al. 2024, Mycol. Prog. 23: 69 (variation by species and location; S. coronaria and S. crassa); Borovička J 2004, Mykol. Sborn. 81(3): 97-99 (7,090 mg/kg). Then WR judges whether the level is a property of the species or of the place.
Medicinal Use. Listed as medicinal: Wu et al. 2026, 药用(有毒) ‘medicinal, possibly poisonous’. Under investigation: see Needs Investigation.
Cite this pageRubel, William. 2026. “Sarcosphaera coronaria.” Taxonomy of Toxins. Last modified 24 October 2026. https://taxonomyoftoxins.com/species/sarcosphaera-coronaria/