Study on Plant Growth Promoting Traits of PGPR Isolates From Semi-Arid Kachchh, Gujarat Under Salt Stress Conditions

Abstract

Salinity is a major problem in the agricultural sector, as it turns productive agronomical land to become unproductive. Therefore, Plant-growth-promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR), that live in the plant root zone named the rhizosphere, is one of the prominent solutions to overcome this problem in an eco-friendly manner as Rhizobacteria responds to osmotic stress and support plant development. Thus, the present study was aimed to characterize various traits of the PGPR strains isolated from saline soils of Kachchh. The characterization of the traits in the presence and absence of sodium chloride was assessed including IAA production (76.97±1.68 mg/l), Ammonia production (38.59±0.19 mg/l), Siderophore production (49.21±1.83%), Phosphate solubilization (4897.73±25.53 mg/l). When assessed for the salt tolerance of the strains in the presence of NaCl between 20-50 gm/L, the strain D6 exhibited a better growth even at 5% NaCl concentration (2.047OD). Further, the effect of PGPR on the growth of V. radiata was 100% in all the experimental setup, whereas in case of B. juncea, the highest germination of 96.67% was observed only in T2 and T1+T2+T3. Further, the molecular sequencing of the strains revealed the identification of the strains as Klebsiella quasipneumoniae, Bacillus paralicheniformis and Klebsiella pneumoniae.