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Fungal growth promotor endophytes: a pragmatic approach towards sustainable food and agriculture

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Abstract

Agricultural productivity suffers a heavy loss due to plant pathogens, insect pests and various abiotic stresses. Agriculture being the world’s largest economic sector, it is the need of time to find and establish the ideal strategy for sustainable agriculture and improvement in crop growth. Endophytes are microorganisms that asymptomatically grow within the plant tissues without causing any disease to the host. Endophytic fungi live in symbiotic association with plants and play an important role in plant growth promotion, higher seed yield and plants resistant to various biotic, abiotic stresses and diseases. Many are able to produce antimicrobial compounds, plant growth hormones and various agrochemical bioactive metabolites. These mycoendophytes hold enormous potential for the development of eco-friendly and economically viable agricultural products. In this review we focused on the endophytic fungi recovered from different medicinal plants, their active principles involved in plant growth enhancement and the applications of fungal endophytes in agriculture. Moreover, we also discussed about endophytic fungi and their pragmatic approach towards sustainable food and agriculture.

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  1. Department of Biotechnology, Sant Gadge Baba Amravati University, Amravati, 444 602, Maharashtra, India

    Mahendra Rai, Dnyaneshwar Rathod, Gauravi Agarkar & Mudasir Dar

  2. Institute of Chemistry, Biological Chemistry Laboratory, Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Campinas, SP, Brazil

    Mahendra Rai

  3. Department of Plant Physiology, Slovak University of Agriculture in Nitra, Tr. A. Hlinku 2, 949 76, Nitra, Slovakia

    Marian Brestic

  4. DEPAN – Faculdade de Engenharia de Alimentos (FEA), UNICAMP, Monteiro Lobato st., 80, Campinas, SP, 13083-862, Brazil

    Glaucia Maria Pastore & Mario Roberto Marostica Junior

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Rai, M., Rathod, D., Agarkar, G. et al. Fungal growth promotor endophytes: a pragmatic approach towards sustainable food and agriculture. Symbiosis 62, 63–79 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13199-014-0273-3

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