Strategies to enhance the use of endophytes as bioinoculants in agriculture

Abstract

The findings on the strategies employed by endophytic microbes have provided salient information to the researchers on the need to maximally explore them as bio-input in agricultural biotechnology. Biotic and abiotic factors are known to influence microbial recruitments from external plant environments into plant tissues. Endophytic microbes exhibit mutualism or antagonism association with host plants. The beneficial types contribute to plant growth and soil health, directly or indirectly. Strategies to enhance the use of endophytic microbes are desirable in modern agriculture, such that these microbes can be applied individually or combined as bioinoculants with bioprospecting in crop breeding systems. Scant information is available on the strategies for shaping the endophytic microbiome; hence, the need to unravel microbial strategies for yield enhancement and pathogen suppressiveness have become imperative. Therefore, this review focuses on the endophytic microbiome, mechanisms, factors influencing endophyte recruitment, and strategies for possible exploration as bioinoculants.