About the Authors

Akio Tani

atani@rib.okayama-u.ac.jp

Affiliation Institute of Plant Science and Resources, Okayama University, Okayama, Japan

Yuichiro Takai

Affiliation Research Institute of Environment, Agriculture and Fisheries, Osaka Prefectural Government, Osaka, Japan

Ikko Suzukawa

Affiliation Meiho-Construction Incorporation, Shiga, Japan

Motomu Akita

Affiliation Faculty of Biological Engineering, Kinki University, Wakayama, Japan

Haruhiko Murase

Affiliation Graduate School of Agriculture and Biological Sciences, Osaka Prefecture University, Osaka, Japan

Kazuhide Kimbara

Affiliations Institute of Plant Science and Resources, Okayama University, Okayama, Japan, Faculty of Engineering, Shizuoka University, Shizuoka, Japan

Competing Interests

The authors have the following interests to declare: Ikko Suzukawa is employed by Meiho-Construction who sell the moss grown by the technique described in the manuscript. A patent application has been submitted on their isolates to grow the moss and is now under review in some countries including Japan. The patent uses part of the data that are used in this manuscript. There are no other patents, products in development or other marketed products to declare. This does not alter the authors' adherence to all the PLoS ONE policies on sharing data and materials.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: AT MA HM KK. Performed the experiments: AT YT IS MA. Analyzed the data: AT YT IS. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: AT YT IS MA. Wrote the paper: AT YT IS MA HM KK.