[in Chinese with English abstract: ] In order to isolate the drought-resistant gene from the mycobiont of desert lichens, the desiccation-tolerance biological research and liquid culture were performed. The mycobiont isolated from the desert lichen Glypholecia scabra, was studied under the water stress. The results showed that the mycobiont isolated from G. scabra would accumulate soluble sugars and increase the concentration of total phenols and reduce glutathione (GSH) to protect itself from low water activities. It could be inferred that the genes relating to the metabolic pathways of phenols and GSH, may likely to be the candidates of drought-tolerance genes for cloning and expression analysis at aw=0.90 and aw=0.85. Additionally, in order to provide enough materials for cloning and expression analysis, optimal liquid culture conditions of the mycobiont isolated from G. scabra were studied using Plackett-Burman design and orthogonal arrays. The optimized medium (pH6.3) consisted of 15g glucose, 2g soy peptone, and 200μg Vitamin B12 in 1L potato extract. 150mL medium filled in 250mL triangular flask was shaken under revolving speed of 100r/min, at 18℃. The growth curve showed that the biomass of the mycobiont isolated from G. scabra was improved significantly under the optimized conditions. Key words: drought-tolerance gene, water stress, orthogonal arrays, growth curve.