In a natural ecosystem, the plant is in a symbiotic relationship with beneficial endophytes contributing huge impact on its host plant. Therefore, exploring beneficial endophytes and understanding its interaction is a prospective area of research. The present work aims to characterize the fungal endophytic communities associated with healthy maize and rice plants and to study the deterministic factors influencing plant growth and biocontrol properties against phytopathogens, viz, Pythium ultimum, Sclerotium oryzae, Rhizoctonia solani, and Pyricularia oryzae. A total of 123 endophytic fungi was isolated using the culture-dependent approach from different tissue parts of the plant. Most dominating fungal endophyte associated with both the crops belong to genus Fusarium, Sarocladium, Aspergillus, and Penicillium and their occurrence was not tissue specific. The isolates were screened for in vitro plant growth promotion, stress tolerance, disease suppressive mechanisms and based on the results, each culture from both the cereal crops was selected for further study. Acremonium sp. (ENF 31) and Penicillium simplicisssum (ENF22), isolated from maize and rice respectively could potentially inhibit the growth of all the tested pathogens with 46.47 ± 0.16 mm to 60.09 ± 0.04 mm range zone of inhibition for ENF31 and 35.48 ± 0.14 to 62.29 ± 0.15 mm for ENF22. Both significantly produce the defensive enzymes, ENF31 could tolerate a wide range of pH from 2 to 12, very important criteria, for studying plant growth in different soil types, especially acidic as it is widely prevalent here, making more land unsuitable for cultivation. ENF22 grows in pH range 3–12, with 10% salt tolerating ability, another factor of consideration. Study of root colonization during 7th to 30th days of growth phase reveals that ENF31 could colonize pleasantly in rice, though a maize origin, ranging from 1.02 to 1.21 log10 CFU/g root and in maize, it steadily colonizes ranging from 0.95 to 1.18 log10 CFU, while ENF22 could colonize from 0.98 to 1.24 Log10CFU/g root in rice and 1.01 to 1.24Log10CFU/g root in maize, just the reverse observed in Acremonium sp. Therefore, both the organism has the potency of a promising Bio-resource agent, that we must definitely explore to fill the gap in the agriculture industry.

We report here the 3.6-Mb draft genome of Bacillus altitudinis Lc5, a potential plant growth promoter and an active antagonistic endophyte of black rice. This genome study will provide better insights into the strain’s mechanisms for plant growth promotion and biocontrol, thus facilitating its application in organic agriculture.

This paper reports the characterization of naturally occurring rhizobacteria from NE India for the control of wilt and damping-off diseases in French beans. French bean (<i>Phaseolus vulgaris</i> L.) is one of the most important food legumes for direct human consumption which was originated from South and Central America. In NE India wilt and damping-off in beans are serious diseases which are mainly caused by <i>Fusarium spp</i> and <i>Rhizoctonia solani</i>. Out of 625 bacterial isolates obtained from French bean growing fields of Manipur, 15 potential isolates were selected, whose inhibition zone width were more than 15 mm. Strain IBSD-LKBI exhibited strong antagonistic activity and can inhibit both the pathogens. Besides, this strain also produced extracellular hydrolytic enzymes (protease, chitinase, <i>β</i>-1, 3-glucanase), secondary metabolites (Siderophore, HCN). It also produces plant growth promoting hormone (IAA) and can solubilize organic phosphate. <i>Burkholderia cepacia</i> IBSD-LKBI exhibited the highest plant growth promotion and BCA. After 60 days of treatment, plant height, root length, fresh weight and % of disease suppression were significantly (P < 0.05) higher than in control plants. Productions of secondary metabolites were detected using gene specific primer. This bacterium was phenotypically characterized and sequence data of 16S rDNA revealed the closest identity with <i>Burkholderia cepacia</i> (98%). Multiple sequence alignment & phylogram with closely related sequence accessions using MEGA Software revealed this naturally occurring biocontrol bacteria belongs to <i>Burkholderia cepacia</i> complex genomovar I based on the Biolog identification system with 16S rDNA gene sequence analysis. This organism is one of the new reports from NE India for the control of wilt and damping-off diseases in French beans

No abstract