Assays of survival and inoculation of Burkholderia tropica on tomato

FRICK J.; MOYANO D.; GARCIA FERREYRA G.; COUYOUPETROU, MANUEL; LUNA M. F.

Villa Carlos Paz, Cordoba

Congreso; VI Congreso Argentino de Microbiologia General; 2009

Sociedad Argentina de Microbiologia General

The use of Plant Growth Promoting Bacteria (PGPB) as biofertilizer and biocontrol organisms is being considered as an alternative or a supplemental way of reducing the use of chemicals in agriculture. The growth stimulation by the microorganisms can be a consequence of nitrogen fixation, the production of phytohormones, biocontrol of phytopathogens in the root zone or by enhancing availability of minerals (Rosenblueth and Martinez-Romero, 2006). Bacteria on roots and in the rhizosphere benefits from root exudates, but some bacteria are capable of entering the plant as endophytes that do not cause harm and could establish a mutualistic association. In both cases a key feature of plant-beneficial bacteria associations is the efficient colonization of root surfaces. To ensure an effective colonization it is necessary to use a successful inoculant and an adequate inoculation process. In this way and with the knowledge of Burkholderia strains are promising candidates for biotechnological applications (Caballero-Mellado et al., 2007), in the present study has been performed experiment of seed and seedlings inoculation (<i>Lycopersicon esculentum, cv. platense italiano</i>) with <i>Burkholderia tropica</i> to investigate the colonization behavior on gnotobiotically grown. Survival microorganism experiments on tomato seeds were carried out to complete this approach. Microscopy results indicated that B. tropica was able to colonize tomato plants independently of the inoculation form but surfaced sterilized root bacterial enumerations was lower in the case of seed inoculation. The evaluation of viability in tomato seeds showed that B. tropica survived during germination period in filter paper or soft agar.