I spent part of this week dealing with contamination issues in a mycelium materials project/production.
What stood out wasn't the production process itself, but the environment around it. We're based in a highland area with consistently high humidity. Moreover, there are cattle farms and mushroom farms nearby. Those conditions are great for biological activity, but they also make contamination much harder to control, especially during the rainy season.
It's made me wonder how much of scaling biomaterials is actually about improving the manufacturing process, and how much depends on adapting to the local environment.
Has anyone working with biological systems run into similar challenges?