What Kind Of Mold Is It?
Aka Moldlab Delivers Results
by Joe Wheeler

Contractors have become familiar with mold on the back end: The lawsuit alleging that they or their products caused it to grow.

What they’re not so familiar with is mold in the middle of the process: The scientific identification of the sample by a laboratory.

Photo: Mold in hand. The green mold is Aspergillus, the brown one is Phoma. The other is Aspergillus Fumigatus.

A good lab can provide accurate results with a fast turnaround time. That is critical when you have a team of remediators in the field waiting for the results before they proceed with their work. Delays can cost tens of thousands of dollars a day.

Their primary tools are incubators and microscopes, with the methodology being to examine samples directly, or create an environment for spores to grow so they can be identified.

It’s time consuming work. There are 100,000 species of mold common to the United States. Only about 200 have been known to be harmful to humans. The key is simply knowing what to look for, and knowing what you’re looking at.

Sean Abbot, Phd, is a mycologist with 15 years experience in the field. Abbot must examine the samples to determine what kind of spores are present in the environment.

"We process mostly air and surface samples determining types and quantities of different fungi, and some bacterial identification as well," Abbot said.

Daniel Kocher, president of aka Moldlab, said that much of the work they do is not for the remediatiors themselves, but with others working them: Industrial hygienists, environmental engineers and building inspectors.

Kocher said it’s part of how the industry has come to handle the constant present of litigation

"Anytime you are trying to be aware of possible lawsuits, you always want to keep things objective. The industry has designed itself so that the people who are doing the removal and the work are not the same people who take the sample, so that there is a line of objectivity there," Kocher said. "So a person may come in and take the samples, and another group of people do the work, and that same person can come in at the end and do the clearance sampling and still be objective."

Once aka Moldlab gets a sample, they go to work. Microscopes are the staple of the lab’s equipment. Mycologist Sean Abbot said that most of his fungal identification work is microscopy based, so he has a variety of microscopes with which to work.

"Mostly we have compound scopes equipped to go the maximum magnification of 1000 times, but our routine work is mostly done at about 400 times. That’s the magnification required for morphological recognition of spores," Abbot said. "We look at spore types. Colors. Ornamentations. The mode of spore development is important for fungal identification."

Most field samples don’t allow visual identification. There’s not enough spores visible at the time. Such samples must be grown in the lab to reveal the species of fungi present.

Abbot said the lab uses incubators to grow samples in petri dishes, then a Class 2 Bio-Safety Cabinet to handle the spores. The cabinet is a particle filtration hood equipped with HEPA filters that uses an air curtain to prevent anything from inside the cabinet from reaching the worker. The air curtain also prevents anything from the room entering the cabinet and contaminating what the worker is handling. It’s a dual sterility chamber for working with small particles.

He pulled out a dish that seemed alive with a greenish mold. Abbot said it was Penicillium, and it didn’t take long to reach the point where it could be seen without magnification.

"These about a week old, and came from carpet dust samples from a building that probably had or has moisture problems and occupant health complaints," Abbot said. "In this case there seems there’s a lot of Penicillium growing, which would support the original idea that there was some exposure to molds in that building."

Growing mold is actually quite easy. Even room temperatures are adequate for most fungi. Abbot said he incubates at about 25 degrees Celsius (76 f), and will use higher temperature for growing opportunistic pathogens. The trick, according to Abbot, is knowing how to produce accurate results from samples.

"We do a suspension in a cereal dilution onto a variety of different selective media," Abbot said. "We’re looking for different types of fungi to grow on different types of media. One media called cellulose auger is very good for recovering Stachybotrys."

Not every mold grows everywhere or under the same conditions, so Some media, such as a solution in a petri dish, will select out certain organisms such as Stachy. Even if it’s present in the sample, it won’t grow in the media. For that reason, Abbot tests using a variety of media to get accurate results.

Kocher said that proper sampling is key. "One of the things we’re trying to encourage people is to not just sample with one type. Because what you need is to get an overall picture," he said. "Each sampling method could be considered like a photograph. If you have lots of them, you can create a more accurate picture of what’s going on."

Sampling and testing aren’t the only parts of the process.

"Identifying the fungi is one step, but once you get it removed and remediated, you’ve got to find the source. Most of the time it’s some form of water intrusion or flood," Kocher said. "An example I bring up is that you’ve had a roof leak with water going down some walls. You end up with mold growth. It gets identified, they figure out where it’s growing inside the walls, they take clearance samples to prove that it’s gone. But if nobody patches the roof, you’re going to get the mold again."

aka Moldlab Chose Reno To Launch Lab

Kocher said that he and Abbot and associate Linda were in the San Francisco Bay Area working in the mycology field when they examined the challenge and opportunity of starting their own facility.

There were two parts to their decision to move to Reno.

"The first part was to save costs between here and the Bay Area," Kocher said. "The second was the friendly nature of Nevada towards businesses. That made it easy to open up here and stay here."

Kocher said he was surprised at the market for his services in the Reno area. "It kind of took us back because the market in Reno itself is extensive. We hope to have another facility in Las Vegas in the near future," he said.

Aka Moldlab wants to be a more than just a place to process samples. Kocher says he and Abbot are already providing that extra level of service.

"The analysis continues into consulting and really dealing with clients. We frequently have people call us because they want to go over a report, they want to get Dr. Abbot’s depth of understanding to being their report to that fuller level," Kocher said. "When they, in turn, talk to their clients, they have the depth they need to understand it correctly."

Kocher said that one of his goals is to get into more training and education, and really work with people so that they have a better understanding of the entire process.

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