Isolation of Trichoderma spp. and determination of their antagonistic, biochemical and plant growth promotion activity

Vishal Tripathi1, Rajesh Singh2, BK Sharma3, HB Singh3

1Environment and Sustainable Development, BHU, Varanasi-221005

2Genetics and Plant Breeding, IAS, BHU, Varanasi-221005

3Mycology and Plant Pathology, BHU, Varanasi-221005

Received: 04 September 2015                                            Revised Accepted: 11 October 2015

ABSTRACT

Trichoderma spp. has been reported to be effective in controlling plant diseases, and the action of fungal hydrolytic enzymes has been considered as one of the mechanism involved in the antagonistic process. In this study a total of 27 Trichoderma isolates were isolated from the rhizospheric soil samples of different plants collected from Mirzapur district of Uttar Pradesh. The biocontrol activities of these isolates were studied by dual culture method against the phyto-pathogens Rhizoctonia solani and Sclerotium rolfsii. Trichoderma isolate BM-4(ii) showed maximum inhibition (88.00%) of Sclerotium rolfsii, whereas Trichoderma isolate BG-3(ii) showed the maximum inhibition (88.88%) of Rhizoctonia solani. This effect might be attributed to the different mechanism of actions opted by different Trichoderma species. Further all the 27 isolates were screened for the production of secondary metabolites. Out of the 27 isolates, all the isolates produced cellulase, lipase, and amylase, 11 of them produced protease, 18 produced chitinase, and 17 produced pectinase and phosphatase both. Selected isolates of Trichoderma were examined for plant growth promotion on Moong, as a marked increase in the root length and shoot length was observed in comparison to control which was not treated with Trichoderma. SDS PAGE analysis of the seedlings treated with Trichoderma showed that there was an increase in the total protein content of the seedlings in comparison to the untreated control seedlings.

Key Words: Plant growth promotion, Secondary metabolite, SDS PAGE