Abstract: This study was done to evaluate the absorption and accumulation of highly toxic inorganic arsenic (As) species in the fruit bodies of Lentinus edodes from the culture medium added with different amounts of arsenite (As(III)) or arsenate (As(V)) during two consecutive crop years. High performance liquid chromatography coupled with inductivity coupled plasma mass spectrometry (HPLC-ICP-MS) was used to detect the contents of five As species in Lentinus edodes and the corresponding culture medium. The results showed that the accumulation coefficients of As(III) and As(V), when added at levels of 0.3–10 mg/kg, in Lentinus edodes ranged from 0.36 to 0.84 and from 0.82 to 7.53, respectively, and at addition levels of 0.33–0.38 mg/kg, the accumulation in Lentinus edodes could be fitted to the following equations: y = ?1.138 9x2 + 0.921 6x ? 0.004 for As(III), and y = ?9.024 3x2 ? 4.388 1x + 0. 838 7 for As(V), where x and y were the contents of As(III) or As(V) in the culture medium and the fruit bodies, respectively. The yield of Lentinus edodes was reduced even to reach zero with increasing concentration of As(III) or As(V) in the culture medium. The critical value was 0.33 mg/kg for both As species. The content of As(III) in the culture medium gradually decreased with cultivation time, while the content of As(V) increased slightly. The content of organic arsenic in the fruit bodies of Lentinus edodes increase with the addition of As(III) or As(V), which may be related to the transformation of As(III) into As(V) or organic arsenic during the growth of Lentinus edodes.

Key words: Lentinus edodes, arsenic, speciation analysis, migration patterns