Salinity is one of the most brutal environmental factors limiting the productivity of crop plants because most of the crop plants are sensitive to salinity caused by high concentrations of salts in the soil, and the area of land affected by it is increasing day by day. For all important crops, average yields are only a fraction - somewhere between 20% and 50% of record yields; these losses are mostly due to drought and high soil salinity, environmental conditions which will worsen in many regions because of global climate change. A wide range of adaptations and mitigation strategies are required to cope with such impacts. Efficient resource management and crop/livestock improvement for evolving better breeds can help to overcome salinity stress. However, such strategies being long drawn and cost intensive, there is a need to develop simple and low cost biological methods for salinity stress management, which can be used on short term basis. Microorganisms could play a significant role in this respect, if we exploit their unique properties such as tolerance to saline conditions, genetic diversity, synthesis of compatible solutes, production of plant growth promoting hormones, bio-control potential, and their interaction with crop plants.

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A halotolerant actinobacterial strain isolated from salinity affected soil of Eastern Indo-Gangetic plains (IGP), Uttar Pradesh, India, was characterised for its antagonistic potential against by dual-culture assay. It was shown to effectively inhibit the growth of with an inhibition zone of 27 ± 1.33 mm. Further the actinobacterial strain was evaluated for its plant growth promoting (PGP) properties and its ability to produce biocontrol related extracellular enzymes amylase, protease, cellulase, chitinase, gelatinase and urease. The results revealed that the actinobacterial strain had PGP potential along with positive assay for amylase, chitinase and urease. The interaction study between antagonist strain and fungal pathogen, performed by scanning electron microscopy technique revealed that the actinobacterium was able to damage fungal mycelia may be due to chitinase, establishing its role as a potential antagonist against. The actinobacterial isolate was characterised by 16S rDNA gene sequencing, and was identified as genera. The identified gene sequence was deposited to NCBI GenBank with an accession number KP331758.

Hydrocarbon fuels are one of the most common global environmental pollutants which cannot be easily degraded owing to their hydrophobic nature. The present study involves the degradation of hydrocarbons by biosurfactant producing bacterial consortia. In this study, results showed 73.66% and 75.80% degradation of 2% mobil oil hydrocarbons in contaminated soil by biosurfactant producing bacterial consortium with wheat (Triticum aestivum) and mustard (Brassica juncea) crops, respectively. Therefore, it indicates that the developed bacterial consortium are capable for the effective degradation of mobil oil hydrocarbons in wheat and mustard rhizosphere and hence can be employed effectively for the degradation of mobil oil hydrocarbons in oil contaminated soils. Phthalate esters formed during the degradation can be used for industrial applications like PVC softening.

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