Growth Effect of Cinnamomum kanehirae Cuttings Associated with its Dark Septate Endophytes

A brassinosteroid functional analogue increases soybean drought resilience

Drought severely affects soybean productivity, challenging breeding/management strategies to increase crop resilience. Hormone-based biostimulants like brassinosteroids (BRs) modulate growth/defence trade-off, mitigating yield losses; yet, natural molecule's low stability challenges the development of cost-effective and long-lasting analogues. Here, we investigated for the first time the effects of BR functional analogue DI-31 in soybean physiology under drought by assessing changes in growth, photosynthesis, water relations, antioxidant metabolism, nodulation, and nitrogen homeostasis. Moreover, DI-31 application frequencies' effects on crop cycle and commercial cultivar yield stabilisation under drought were assessed. A single foliar application of DI-31 favoured plant drought tolerance, preventing reductions in canopy development and enhancing plant performance and water use since the early stages of stress. The analogue also increased the antioxidant response, favouring nitrogen homeostasis maintenance and attenuating the nodular senescence. Moreover, foliar applications of DI-31 every 21 days enhanced the absolute yield by ~ 9% and reduced drought-induced yield losses by ~ 7% in four commercial cultivars, increasing their drought tolerance efficiency by ~ 12%. These findings demonstrated the practical value of DI-31 as an environmentally friendly alternative for integrative soybean resilience management under drought.

Insights into the beneficial roles of dark septate endophytes in plants under challenging environment: resilience to biotic and abiotic stresses

Dark septate endophytes (DSE) exert a plethora of effects in regulating plant growth, signalling and stress tolerance. The advent of metagenomics has led to the identification of various species of DSE to be associated with plant organs. They are known to modulate growth, nutrient uptake, phytohormone biosynthesis and production of active bioconstituents in several plants. The interactions between the DSE and host plants are mostly mutualistic but they can also be neutral or exhibit negative interactions. The DSE has beneficial role in removal/sequestration of toxic heavy metals from various environmental sites. Here, we discuss the beneficial role of DSE in enhancing plant tolerance to heavy metal stress, drought conditions, high salinity and protection from various plant pathogens. Furthermore, the underlying mechanism of stress resilience facilitated by DSE-plant interaction has also been discussed. The article also provides insights to some important future perspectives associated with DSE-mediated phytoremediation and reclamation of polluted land worldwide thus facilitating sustainable agriculture.

The Effect of Dark Septate Endophytic Fungi on Mahonia oiwakensis

This is the first study to discuss the effects of dark septate endophytes (DSE) on the growth promotion and berberine concentration in Mahonia oiwakensis, whose extract (MOE) has been suggested to have potential therapeutic effects against human lung cancer. First, as per phylogenetic analysis, the strains were divided into four groups: CkDB2, CkDB5, MoAL2 and MoAL5. All of these were DSEs, which could form microsclerotia in M. oiwakensis. The growth response experiment revealed that inoculation of the plant with MoAL5 and CkDB5 promoted an increase in the total fresh weight of the seedlings. Chemical composition analysis showed that seedlings inoculated with CkDB5 had the highest berberine concentration. These results showed that some DSEs have the ability to promote growth and induce phytochemical responses in the host plant.

Integration of Nitrogen and Biofertilizer on the Agronomic Efficiency and Quality of Shallot (<i>Allium ascalonicum</i> L.) Plant in the Rainy Season

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE

In the rainy season farmers don't interest to cultivate shallot because in addition to providing a high dosage of fertilizer they are also sensitive to pathogenic attacks so they are afraid of crop failure and cause low shallot production. This study aimed to knew effect of agronomic component and quality of shallot under different concentrations of biofertilizer and Ammonium Sulphate (AS) fertilizer dose in the rainy season.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The study was conducted in Cangkring, Srandakan, Bantul, Special Region of Yogyakarta Indonesia from August to October 2019. The study was arranged in RCBD factorial with three replications. The first factor was a various dose of ammonium sulphate (100, 200 and 300 kg ha-1). The second factor was various concentrations of biofertilizer (2, 3 and 4%), and control. The observed variables were the analysis of growth yield and quality component of shallot plant. The analyzed using analysis of variance at 5% of significance then continued by DMRT at 5% of significance.

RESULTS

There was the interaction between the application of AS dosage and biofertilizer concentration on all of variable observations. There was a significant difference between treatment with control on all of the observation variables.

CONCLUSION

The combination of AS fertilizer 200 kg ha-1 dose and 3% biofertilizer concentration increased agronomic efficiency, growth, bulbs yields, and quality of bulbs include provitamin A, oleoresin compounds.