ANTIFUNGAL EFFICACY OF AQUEOUS EXTRACTS OF NEEM CAKE, KARANJ CAKE AND VERMICOMPOST AGAINST SOME PHYTOPATHOGENIC FUNGI

Several agro-based waste and byproducts are known and cited to play an important role in the management of plant diseases in ancient texts. They act directly or indirectly on plant pathogens to inhibit the growth and multiplication or by inducing resistance in crop plants. In the present experiments, aqueous extracts of neem cake, karanj cake and vermicompost were tested against some important phytopathogenic fungi viz., Helminthosporium pennisetti, Curvularia lunata and Colletotrichum gloeosporioides f. sp. mangiferae for their antifungal activities. H. pennisetti was found to be most sensitive one followed by C. gloeosporioides f. sp. mangiferae and C. lunata against all the tested drugs. Against C. gloeosporioides f. sp. mangiferae, aqueous extract of karanj cake was most effective where GI50 was found to be 0.41% drug concentration followed by neem cake (0.46%) and vermicompost (0.86%). In case of C. lunata and H. pennisetti, neem cake extract was most effective with GI50 value of 0.27% and 0.11% respectively. The GI50 values noted for C. lunata with extracts of karanj cake (0.70%), vermicompost (0.88%) and for H. pennisetti were (0.20%) and (0.22%) respectively

IOCONTROL POTENTIALS OF TRICHODERMA HARZIANUM AGAINST SCLEROTIAL FUNGI

Trichoderma species are well known antagonists which have strong bio-control potential against soilborne phytopathogenic fungi. Five potential isolates of Trichoderma hazianum were isolated from two different types of soils in which two were from alfisol (mango and litchi orchards) of the ICAR RCER Research Centre, Plandu, Ranchi, Jharkhand, India and three were from the inceptisol (Eastern Uttar Pradesh) India using Trichoderma Selective Medium (TSM) and characterized. Two alfisol (native) isolates (Th-4 and Th-5) along with three inceptisol isolates of Varanasi (Th-1, Th-2 and Th-3) were used in screening of antagonistic potential against two phyto- pathogenic sclerotial fungi Rhizoctonia solani and Sclerotium rolfsii in dual culture. Among the isolates, the local/native ones isolated from alfisol have shown potential antagonism and inhibited R. solani with percent inhibition of 46.77 and 50.34 as compared to inceptisol isolates with inhibition percentage of 22.33, 26.21 and 23.08 respectively. The alfisol isolates also showed potential antagonism against S. rolfsii with percent inhibition of 44.67 and 47.88 as compared to inceptisol isolates with inhibition percentage of 3.97, 7.97 and 28.72 respectively. Compared to inceptisol isolates, biomass accumulation and total phenol content was also reported high in the alfisol isolates

Control of Ralstonia solanacearum Infection in Tomato, Brinjal and Capsicum by antibiotic sensitivity test

Ralstonia solanacearum is one of the important dreaded soil’s borne bacterial phytopathogen which causes enormous losses in the crop plants in tropical, subtropical and temperate region of the world. In India, the disease is highly prevalent and active throughout the year where the soil is acidic in the Eastern Plateau and Hill Region. Once the disease is established in the field, it cannot be controlled by chemical means. Keeping these in view, screening of potential antibiotics for the management of R. solanacearum was done. In the present study, three strains of R. solanacearum were isolated from Brinjal, Tomato and Capsicum. Against these three strains of R. solanacearum, four antibiotics were screened through food poison techniques viz. Kasugamycin, Streptomycin, Ceftriaxone and Gentamicin. The different strains of R. solanacearum and antibiotic sensitivity showed varied response. Among the screened antibiotics, Gentamicin showed strong antibacterial efficacy which inhibited 100% Colony-forming Unit (cfu) at very low concentration (1 ppm) followed by Ceftriaxone which inhibited >50% cfu at 1 ppm against all three strains. However, Streptomycin also showed antibacterial efficacy and inhibited >50% cfu at 3 ppm, but Kasugamycin was found less antibacterial as compared to other tested antibiotics and inhibited >50% cfu at 4 ppm

Trichoderma asperellum, a potential fungal biocontrol agent against Aspergillus niger

Trichoderma asperellum is free-living, ubiquitous fungus which is very common in the habitat of soil and root ecosystem, is known as a potent opportunistic, avirulent plant symbionts and it parasitizes several soilborne phytopathogens. Aspergillus niger is well known black mold which causes several storage diseases. Among the storage diseases, black mould disease of onion is an important disease which is caused by A. niger. Antagonsitic potential of T. asperellum was assayed against three isolates of A. niger [RC1, RC2 (isolated from soil samples of Farm 1 and 2) and RC3 isolated from diseases onion]. Antagonistic efficacy of T. asperellum of A. niger almost similar against all the test isolates. Percentage inhibition of radial growth (PIRG) of A. niger by T. asperellum inhibited 55.17% within five days, 77.20% within 7 days and 92.06% in 12 days. Antagonistic efficacy of T. asperellum can be exploited in the management of black mould disease of onion

Metabolomics-Driven Mining of Metabolite Resources:Applications and Prospects for Improving Vegetable Crops

Vegetable crops possess a prominent nutri-metabolite pool that not only contributes to the crop performance in the fields, but also offers nutritional security for humans. In the pursuit of identifying, quantifying and functionally characterizing the cellular metabolome pool, biomolecule separation technologies, data acquisition platforms, chemical libraries, bioinformatics tools, databases and visualization techniques have come to play significant role. High-throughput metabolomics unravels structurally diverse nutrition-rich metabolites and their entangled interactions in vegetable plants. It has helped to link identified phytometabolites with unique phenotypic traits, nutri-functional characters, defense mechanisms and crop productivity. In this study, we explore mining diverse metabolites, localizing cellular metabolic pathways, classifying functional biomolecules and establishing linkages between metabolic fluxes and genomic regulations, using comprehensive metabolomics deciphers of the plant’s performance in the environment. We discuss exemplary reports covering the implications of metabolomics, addressing metabolic changes in vegetable plants during crop domestication, stage-dependent growth, fruit development, nutri-metabolic capabilities, climatic impacts, plant-microbe-pest interactions and anthropogenic activities. Efforts leading to identify biomarker metabolites, candidate proteins and the genes responsible for plant health, defense mechanisms and nutri-rich crop produce are documented. With the insights on metabolite-QTL (mQTL) driven genetic architecture, molecular breeding in vegetable crops can be revolutionized for developing better nutritional capabilities, improved tolerance against diseases/pests and enhanced climate resilience in plants

Measurement of the Higgs boson production rate in association with top quarks in final states with electrons, muons, and hadronically decaying tau leptons at s√=13TeV

The rate for Higgs (H) bosons production in association with either one (tH) or two (tt¯H) top quarks is measured in final states containing multiple electrons, muons, or tau leptons decaying to hadrons and a neutrino, using proton–proton collisions recorded at a center-of-mass energy of 13TeV by the CMS experiment. The analyzed data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 137fb−1. The analysis is aimed at events that contain H→WW, H→ττ, or H→ZZ decays and each of the top quark(s) decays either to lepton+jets or all-jet channels. Sensitivity to signal is maximized by including ten signatures in the analysis, depending on the lepton multiplicity. The separation among tH, tt¯H, and the backgrounds is enhanced through machine-learning techniques and matrix-element methods. The measured production rates for the tt¯H and tH signals correspond to 0.92±0.19(stat)+0.17−0.13(syst) and 5.7±2.7(stat)±3.0(syst) of their respective standard model (SM) expectations. The corresponding observed (expected) significance amounts to 4.7 (5.2) standard deviations for tt¯H, and to 1.4 (0.3) for tH production. Assuming that the Higgs boson coupling to the tau lepton is equal in strength to its expectation in the SM, the coupling yt of the Higgs boson to the top quark divided by its SM expectation, κt=yt/ySMt, is constrained to be within −0.9<κt<−0.7 or 0.7<κt<1.1, at 95% confidence level. This result is the most sensitive measurement of the tt¯H production rate to date.SCOAP

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Not AvailableA natural red dye which is produced by the tiny insects Kerria lacca while feeding on host trees is popularly known as lac dye. Lac dye is a mixture of at least five closely related pure compounds all being anthraquinone derivatives designated as laccaic acid A, B, C, D and E. Anthraquinones isolated from different natural sources and reported to have potent antimicrobial activity. The lac dye, which is also a mixture of anthraquinone derivatives, is expected to exhibit antifungal and antibacterial activity. Lac dye cannot be used as antibacterial and antifungal agent due to its low water solubility and high polarity. Therefore, it is modified into its methyl derivative to enhance its bio-efficacy. Methylated lac dye is characterized with the help of TLC, UV–Vis spectroscopy and FT-IR, NMR analysis. An in vitro spore germination assay was carried out to evaluate the antifungal efficacy of methylated lac dye against some phytopathogenic fungi which commonly caused a various foliar diseases in crop plants viz., Alternaria solani, Curvularia lunata, Erysiphe pisi, Helminthosporium oryzae and Verticillium sp. Among the tested fungi, Verticillum sp. showed highest sensitivity, which showed 100% inhibition at 750 and 1000 lg/ml as compared to control. However, E. pisi an obligate parasite also showed varied sensitivity but at 1000 lg/ml showed 100% spore germination as compared to control. Methylated lac dye also showed strong antibacterial properties against Ralstonia solanacearum at very low concentration (40 and 50 lg/ml). Hence, lac dye may serve as potent antifungal and antibacterial agent in plant disease management.Not Availabl