The field of mycology has grown from an underappreciated subset of botany, to a valuable, modern scientific discipline. As this field of study has grown, there have been significant contributions to science, technology, and industry, highlighting the value of fungi in the modern era. This paper looks at the current research, along with the existing limitations, and suggests future areas where scientists can focus their efforts, in the field mycology. We show how fungi have become important emerging diseases in medical mycology. We discuss current trends and the potential of fungi in drug and novel compound discovery. We explore the current trends in phylogenomics, its potential, and outcomes and address the question of how phylogenomics can be applied in fungal ecology. In addition, the trends in functional genomics studies of fungi are discussed with their importance in unravelling the intricate mechanisms underlying fungal behaviour, interactions, and adaptations, paving the way for a comprehensive understanding of fungal biology. We look at the current research in building materials, how they can be used as carbon sinks, and how fungi can be used in biocircular economies. The numbers of fungi have always been of great interest and have often been written about and estimates have varied greatly. Thus, we discuss current trends and future research needs in order to obtain more reliable estimates. We address the aspects of machine learning (AI) and how it can be used in mycological research. Plant pathogens are affecting food production systems on a global scale, and as such, we look at the current trends and future research needed in this area, particularly in disease detection. We look at the latest data from High Throughput Sequencing studies and question if we are still gaining new knowledge at the same rate as before. A review of current trends in nanotechnology is provided and its future potential is addressed. The importance of Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi is addressed and future trends are acknowledged. Fungal databases are becoming more and more important, and we therefore provide a review of the current major databases. Edible and medicinal fungi have a huge potential as food and medicines, especially in Asia and their prospects are discussed. Lifestyle changes in fungi (e.g., from endophytes, to pathogens, and/or saprobes) are also extremely important and a current research trend and are therefore addressed in this special issue of Fungal Diversity.

真菌学领域已经从一个未被充分重视的植物学子集发展成为一门有价值的现代科学学科。随着这一研究领域的发展，它对科学、技术和工业做出了重大贡献，凸显了真菌在现代的价值。本文着眼于当前的研究以及现有的局限性，并提出了未来科学家可以集中精力的领域，即真菌学领域。我们展示了真菌如何成为医学真菌学中重要的新兴疾病。我们讨论真菌在药物和新化合物发现中的当前趋势和潜力。我们探讨了系统发育组学的当前趋势、其潜力和结果，并解决了系统发育组学如何应用于真菌生态学的问题。此外，还讨论了真菌功能基因组学研究的趋势及其在揭示真菌行为、相互作用和适应的复杂机制方面的重要性，为全面了解真菌生物学铺平了道路。我们研究了当前建筑材料的研究，如何将它们用作碳汇，以及如何将真菌用于生物循环经济。真菌的数量一直引起人们极大的兴趣，并且经常被报道，但估计值却相差很大。因此，我们讨论当前的趋势和未来的研究需求，以获得更可靠的估计。我们讨论机器学习 (AI) 的各个方面以及如何将其用于真菌学研究。植物病原体正在全球范围内影响粮食生产系统，因此，我们着眼于该领域的当前趋势和未来所需的研究，特别是在疾病检测方面。 我们查看高通量测序研究的最新数据，并质疑我们是否仍在以与以前相同的速度获取新知识。回顾了纳米技术的当前趋势，并探讨了其未来的潜力。讨论了丛枝菌根真菌的重要性并承认了未来的趋势。真菌数据库变得越来越重要，因此我们对当前主要数据库进行回顾。食用菌和药用真菌作为食品和药品具有巨大的潜力，特别是在亚洲，并对其前景进行了讨论。真菌生活方式的变化（例如，从内生菌到病原体和/或腐生菌）也极其重要，并且是当前的研究趋势，因此在本期《真菌多样性》特刊中进行了讨论。