title: Native halo-tolerant plant growth promoting rhizobacteriaEnterococcusandPantoeasp. improve seed yield of Mungbean (Vigna radiataL.) under soil salinity by reducing sodium uptake and stress injury.
abstract: The beneficial microbial-plant interaction plays important role in the soil health, crop growth and productivity. Plant growth promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR) are such beneficial microorganisms, which in association with plant roots not only promote their growth but also help in counteracting the detrimental effects of soil stresses. Salt stress is one such stress, frequently confronted by the plants. The present study aimed at isolation and identification of PGPR inhabiting the mungbean rhizosphere, testing them for salt (NaCl) tolerance and subsequently in salt-supplemented mungbean crop. For this purpose, two salt-tolerant bacterial strains belonging to genusPantoeaandEnterococcus,characterized for their P-solubilization ability, indole acetic acid and siderophore production were selected. These two PGPR were further evaluated for their effect on the salt-stressed mungbean plants, grown at two salt concentrations (5 and 10 dS/m). The plants treated with the combination of PGPR showed better performance in growth (16-37 %) and yield (22-32 %), under salt stress, as compared with control. The increasing salt concentration was found to increase the membrane damage, Na+concentration in the plants. PGPR treatments effectively reduced the Na+concentration (17-41 %), membrane damage (1.1-1.5 folds) and enhanced the antioxidants i.e. ascorbic acid (8-26 %) and glutathione (10-30 %) in salt-stressed plants, in comparison to uninoculated stressed plants. Overall, the results indicated that both PGPR were effective as stress mitigators however, in combination they showed relatively better improvement in growth, yield as well as oxidative parameters of the salt-affected plants. These findings about the effects of native salt-tolerant PGPRPantoeaandEnterococcussp. in mungbean crop are novel.
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbial Biotechnology, Panjab University, Chandigarh, 160014 India.
authors.forename: Meenu
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Panwar
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbial Biotechnology, Panjab University, Chandigarh, 160014 India.
authors.forename: Rupinder
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Tewari
authors.affiliation: Department of Botany, Panjab University, Chandigarh, 160014 India.
authors.forename: Harsh
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Nayyar
keywords: Chlorophyll; Growth; Mungbean; PGPR; Salt stress; Sodium; Stress injury