Method for producing grown materials and products made thereby

US-9485917-B2 covers a method for making a composite material by growing fungal mycelium through and around loose particles to bind them into a solid. In plain terms, claim 1 specifies: forming an inoculum containing a preselected fungus; preparing a mixture of discrete particles plus a digestible nutrient material; adding the inoculum to that mixture; then allowing the fungus to digest the nutrient over a period sufficient for hyphae to grow and form a network of interconnected mycelia cells through and around the particles — thereby bonding them into a self-supporting composite — where at least one component includes water; and finally heating the formed composite to a temperature high enough to kill the fungus. The "kill step" by heating is a key distinguishing limitation: it converts a living biological growth process into a stable, inert manufactured material. The abstract also describes an alternative embodiment in which the fungus is grown as a fruiting body within an enclosure to fill it and form a self-supporting structure.

The patent is assigned to Ecovative Design and names Eben Bayer and Gavin McIntyre — the company's founders. It was granted in 2016. The family is notably large at 44 members across 15 countries, indicating aggressive international prosecution and a clear intent to protect this core process worldwide rather than treating it as a narrow domestic filing. It carries 40 forward citations, the highest of any patent in the surrounding set, which is consistent with its role as an early anchor in the mycelium-materials field rather than a later refinement.

Where this patent stands: This is a foundational/anchor filing for Ecovative's mycelium-composite portfolio, not a defensive continuation or niche tweak. The breadth of claim 1 — particle substrate, nutrient digestion, hyphal binding, heat-kill — captures the basic manufacturing recipe that underpins Ecovative's packaging and grown-materials product lines, and the large multi-country family signals it was treated as a cornerstone asset. Ecovative is the dominant repeat assignee in this space (13 patents, 292 citations across the result set), and this patent sits at the head of that cluster. Its high citation count and large family together mark it as one of the field-defining documents that later filings — including those of competitors — build upon or design around.

The surrounding space is tightly clustered and overwhelmingly dominated by a single player: Ecovative Design appears on 13 of the patents in this set (292 citations) and authors nearly all of the nearest neighbors to the subject patent. The Procter & Gamble Company leads the citation chart (3 patents, 2,724 citations) and Reactive Surfaces (370 citations) ranks second, but those reflect adjacent high-citation chemistry/surface work rather than the core mycelium-binding domain — within the nearest patents, Ecovative is the clear technical center of gravity. The most substantive competitor is MycoWorks Inc (2 patents, 44 citations), which pursues fungal-material production from a different commercial angle (notably leather-like materials). The technology concentration confirms how clustered this field is: Horticulture & Forestry (A01G) runs at 138.6× the corpus baseline and Genetic Engineering (C12N) at 24.3×, both far above the 10× threshold, evidence of a narrow, specialized field.

Closest related patents:

• US-2012225471-A1 — Method for producing a composite material (Gavin McIntyre · 29 citations · 1-member family) — An earlier filing by one of the same inventors describing the same composite-by-mycelium-growth concept; effectively a predecessor disclosure to the subject patent's process.
• US-2012270302-A1 — Method for Making Dehydrated Mycelium Elements and Product Made Thereby (Eben Bayer · 32 citations · 15-member family) — The other co-inventor's parallel filing, with a 15-country family, covering dehydrated mycelium elements; a sibling in the same foundational cluster addressing post-growth processing.
• US-10144149-B2 — Stiff mycelium bound part and method of producing stiff mycelium bound parts (Ecovative Design LLC · 32 citations · 2-member family) — Extends the core binding method toward stiff structural parts, a later refinement of the subject patent's self-supporting composite.
• US-9951307-B2 — Method for producing fungus structures (MycoWorks Inc · 25 citations · 11-member family) — The leading competitor's analogous process for forming fungal structures; the most direct non-Ecovative parallel and a useful marker of where the field's other serious participant operates.

Recent Ecovative filings such as US-11920126-B2 (2024, 1 citation, 3-member family) and US-11293005-B2 (2022, 3 citations) are on-point continuations of this lineage whose low citation counts reflect publication lag rather than low importance — strategic IP the citation-weighted score under-rewards. The field is not academically dominated; commercial assignees (Ecovative, MycoWorks, Mycosys) hold the relevant positions, so the competitive picture is driven by company portfolios rather than university licensing.