Alleviation of Salt Stress in Wheat Seedlings via Multifunctional Bacillus aryabhattai PM34: An In-Vitro Study

Shehzad Mehmood, Amir Abdullah Khan, Fuchen Shi, Muhammad Tahir, Tariq Sultan, Muhammad Farooq Hussain Munis, Prashant Kaushik, Mohammed Nasser Alyemeni and Hassan Javed Chaudhary
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Shehzad Mehmood: Department of Plant Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad 45320, Pakistan
Amir Abdullah Khan: Department of Plant Biology and Ecology, Nankai University, Tianjin 300071, China
Fuchen Shi: Department of Plant Biology and Ecology, Nankai University, Tianjin 300071, China
Muhammad Tahir: Department of Environmental Sciences, Vehari Campus, COMSATS University Islamabad, Vehari 61100, Pakistan
Tariq Sultan: Land Resource Research Institute, NARC, Islamabad 44000, Pakistan
Muhammad Farooq Hussain Munis: Department of Plant Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad 45320, Pakistan
Prashant Kaushik: Kikugawa Research Station, Yokohama Ueki, 2265, Kamo, Kikugawa, Shizuoka 439-0031, Japan
Mohammed Nasser Alyemeni: Department of Botany and Microbiology, College of Science, King Saud University, Riyadh 11451, Saudi Arabia
Hassan Javed Chaudhary: Department of Plant Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad 45320, Pakistan

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 13, issue 14, 1-13

Abstract: Plant growth-promoting rhizobacteria play a substantial role in plant growth and development under biotic and abiotic stress conditions. However, understanding about the functional role of rhizobacterial strains for wheat growth under salt stress remains largely unknown. Here we investigated the antagonistic bacterial strain Bacillus aryabhattai PM34 inhabiting ACC deaminase and exopolysaccharide producing ability to ameliorate salinity stress in wheat seedlings under in vitro conditions. The strain PM34 was isolated from the potato rhizosphere and screened for different PGP traits comprising nitrogen fixation, potassium, zinc solubilization, indole acetic acid, siderophore, and ammonia production, along with various extracellular enzyme activities. The strain PM34 showed significant tolerance towards both abiotic stresses including salt stress (NaCl 2 M), heavy metal (nickel, 100 ppm, and cadmium, 300 ppm), heat stress (60 °C), and biotic stress through mycelial inhibition of Rhizoctonia solani (43%) and Fusarium solani (41%). The PCR detection of ituC, nifH , and acds genes coding for iturin, nitrogenase, and ACC deaminase enzyme indicated the potential of strain PM34 for plant growth promotion and stress tolerance. In the in vitro experiment, NaCl (2 M) decreased the wheat growth while the inoculation of strain PM34 enhanced the germination% (48%), root length (76%), shoot length (75%), fresh biomass (79%), and dry biomass (87%) over to un-inoculated control under 2M NaCl level. The results of experiments depicted the ability of antagonistic bacterial strain Bacillus aryabhattai PM34 to augment salt stress tolerance when inoculated to wheat plants under saline environment.

Keywords: salinity stress; biocontrol; PGPR; Bacillus aryabhattai (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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