Cultivation strategies for Duddingtonia flagrans: A systematic review and bibliometric analysis

Gastrointestinal nematode infections represent one of the primary economic burdens for the global livestock industry. Duddingtonia flagrans (syn. Arthrobotrys flagrans) is the most promising biological control agent for these parasites due to its gastrointestinal-resistant chlamydospores (CL). However, industrial implementation is constrained by the lack of standardized mass-production protocols. This systematic review and bibliometric analysis consolidates evidence on culture media optimization to identify parameters maximizing CL yield, biomass accumulation, and enzymatic activity. Following PRISMA guidelines, a systematic search across PubMed, SCOPUS, Dimensions, and PATENTSCOPE (1991 to April 2026) yielded 48 eligible documents spanning three decades (1996-2025; 42 articles, 6 patents) generating 58 independent records. Most studies (79.2%) presented a low risk of bias. Research trends from the articles were mapped using Bibliometrix. In plate cultures, polyol supplementation (meso-inositol/mannitol) maximized yields up to 10⁶ CL/cm². Submerged fermentation exhibited high variability but reached 9.51 × 10⁸ CL/mL in optimized media. Pure solid-state fermentation showed kinetic limitations, peaking at 1.60 × 10⁶ CL/g. Biphasic fermentation combined liquid-phase biomass expansion with solid-phase induction, achieving 2.01 × 10⁸ CL/g within 14 days. High predatory efficacy was reported in studies that assessed functional quality; however, this outcome was not evaluated consistently across cultivation systems. While direct comparisons remain constrained by heterogeneous reporting metrics and the reliance of certain high-yield benchmarks on patent disclosures, current evidence highlights biphasic systems and optimized submerged fermentation as promising platforms for scale-up, effectively mitigating several kinetic constraints of traditional single-phase methods.