With a focus on food safety, this book highlights the
importance of microbes in sustainable agriculture. Plants, sessile organisms that are considered
as primary producers in
the ecosystem and communicate with above- and below-ground communities that
consist of microbes, insects, and other vertebrate and invertebrate animals, are subjected to various kinds of
stress. Broadly speaking, these can be subdivided into abiotic and biotic
stresses. Plants have evolved to develop elaborate mechanisms for coping with and adapting to
the environmental stresses.


Among
other stresses, habitat-imposed biotic stress is one serious condition causing
major problems for crop
productivity. Most plants employ
plant-growth-promoting microorganisms (PGPMs) to combat and protect themselves from stresses and also
for better growth.


PGPMs
are bacteria associated with plant roots and they augment plant productivity
and immunity. They are
also defined as root-colonizing bacteria that havebeneficial effects on plant growth and development. Remarkably, PGPMs including
mycorrhizae, rhizobia, and rhizobacteria (Acinetobacter, Agrobacterium,
Arthrobacter, Azospirillum, Bacillus, Bradyrhizobium, Frankia, Pseudomonas,
Rhizobium, Serratia, Thiobacillus) form associations with plant roots and
can promote plant growth by increasing plants’ access to soil minerals and protecting them against pathogens.

To combat the pathogens causing different diseases and other biotic stresses, PGPMs produce a higher level of
resistance in addition to plants’
indigenous immune systems in the form of induced systemic resistance (ISR).


The ISR elicited
by PGPMs has suppressed plant diseases caused by a range of pathogens in both
the greenhouse and field. As
such, the role of these microbes can no longer be ignored for
sustainable agriculture.


Today,
PGPMs are also utilized in the form of bio-fertilizers to increase plant
productivity. However, the use of PGPMs requires a precise understanding of the interactions between plants and microbes, between
microbes and microbiota, and how biotic factors influence these
relationships. Consequently, continued research is needed to develop new
approaches to boost the
efficiency of PGPMs and to understand the ecological, genetic and biochemical
relationships in their habitat.




The
book focuses on recent
research concerning interactions between PGPMs and plants under biotic stress. It addresses key concerns
such as –

1.
The response of benign
microbes that benefit
plants under biotic stress

2.
The physiological
changes incurred in plants under harsh conditions

3.
The role of microbial
determinants in promoting
plant growth under biotic stress

The
book focuses on a range of aspects related to PGPMs such as their mode of action, priming
of plant defence and plant growth in disease challenged crops, multifunctional
bio-fertilizers, PGPM-mediated
disease suppression, andthe
effect of PGPMs on secondary metabolites etc.


The
book will be a valuable
asset to researchers and professionals working in the area of
microbial-mediated support of
plants under biotic stress.