Endophytic microorganisms of tropical tuber crops: Potential and perspectives

Endophytic microorganisms which include both bacteria and fungi colonise almost every plant species. In order to colonize the plant and compete with other microorganisms, they produce a plethora of secondary metabolites, including toxins, enzymes, antibiotics, anti-cancer, anti-inflammatory and antifungal compounds. Endophytic fungi can have profound impacts on plant communities which include abiotic and biotic stress tolerance, increase of biomass, decrease of water consumption and alteration of resource allocation, nitrogen fixation, increased drought resistance, thermal protection, survival under osmotic stress and degradation of pollutants. Though tuber crops are the second most important group of crop plants providing food energy to humans after cereals, less attention has been paid to the these traditional crops in general. Investigations regarding the association of endophytes with the tuber crops have been sparsely studied though in some tuber crops like cassava, sweet potato and yams, presence of endophytes have been reported. Hence from the scarcely available literature, in the current review an attempt was made to put light on the various beneficial activities of endophytes on tuber crops. These reports glorified many symbiotically associated endophytes to have antagonistic properties against many plant pathogens like Rhizoctoniasolani, Pythiumaphanidermatumand Sclerotiumrolfsii. Species like Rahnellawas resilient to cold shock, UV irradiation and antibiotics. Many diazotropihic and non-diazotropihicendophytic bacteria were involved in nitrogen fixation. Actinomycetesendophytes were novel sources of industrially important thermostableamylolytic enzymes. However, inspite of all these profound beneficial effects endophytic associations are still to be studied in many tuber crops like taro, elephant foot yam, greater yam etc. So this review put forward the urge to carry out comprehensive research on these important microbes on such important crops

METABOLIC SYNDROME AMONG DOCTORS: A PILOT STUDY FROM ODISHA

Objective: This study was planned to assess the prevalence of metabolic syndrome (MetS) among doctors of Bhubaneswar. Methods: A cross-sectional, single-centered observational study was conducted among doctors over a period of 8 months after clearance from Institutional Ethical Committee. All consented participants were subjected to anthropometric measurements and physical examination. Fasting plasma glucose and complete lipid profile were estimated using standard procedures after 12 h of overnight fast. MetS was defined according to the Modified National Cholesterol Education Program-Adult Treatment Panel III criteria for MetS screening. Results: Among 170 participants (males - 117 and females - 53), 64 (37.65%) were with MetS. Prevalence of same was higher in males (41.9%) than females (28.3%). The younger doctors (≤40 years) had more prevalence of MetS compared to the elderly (>40 years) doctors (41 [39.8%] vs. 23 [34.3%]). In the males, high blood pressure was the major contributor to the prevalence of MetS followed by low high-density lipoproteins-cholesterol (HDL-C) and high triglyceride values. However, in females, low HDL-C and greater waist circumference contributed the maximum to MetS. Conclusion: In the present study, the young male doctors have a greater prevalence of MetS than the older and the females. MetS is still a significant public health problem in the educated population including those of doctors, especially the younger ones.Â

Management of Indoor Airborne Aspergillus flavus by Traditional Air Purifiers Commonly used in India

The presence of the ubiquitous fungus Aspergillus flavus along with other seed borne fungi associated with rice in indoor air of farmers’ house has been a major health concern. The problem further worsens when the Aspergillus flavus strain has the ability of producing aflatoxins (a group of mycotoxin) and sclerotia (a resistive structure). Diseases and allergic reactions like asthma, rhinitis, allergic broncho pulmonary mycoses, and hypersensitivity pneumonitis may be caused to inhabitants when aflatoxins, spores, vegetative cells and fungal metabolites are inhaled. Therefore, management of this fungus in indoor air of farmers’ house is very much essential. Farmers house in Odisha particularly in coastal regions are very much susceptible to fungal infection. Due to poor financial conditions management by sophisticated methods seems difficult. Hence, in the current study, efficiency of some herbal and traditional air purifiers like camphor, dasang jhuna, hawan samagri, cow dung-urine has been evaluated for the suppression of Aspergillus flavus. These materials are known to be used in various rituals and festivals by people in rural areas. All the traditional air purifiers have been found useful to inhibit the growth and proliferation of the fungus particularly cowdung-urine mixure proved to have fungicidal effect. Based on the strong belief and practice of Indian traditions and rituals along with scientific support from the current study and knowledge from literatures, these traditional materials may be very useful for the management and suppression of toxigenic and sclerotic Aspergillus flavus consequently suppressing indoor air problems in farmers’ house

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Not AvailableTraditional rice varieties grown by the farmers serve as valuable genetic resources for future rice improvement. These varieties are highly adapted to varied agro-ecological conditions. However, they are rapidly lost because of the adoption of high-yielding varieties. The extent of allelic and genetic diversity present in the germplasm is a prerequisite for the improvement of any crop and conservation strategies under adverse impacts of climate. Farmers' rice varieties are usually poor yielders but are allelic treasurer for different traits, especially biotic and abiotic stresses, grain qualities, early seedling vigor, input use efficiency, etc. Therefore, the present study was aimed for a detailed understanding of allelic and genetic diversity, and population structure of 607 farmers' rice varieties using 36 fluorescently labeled microsatellite markers and 53 morphological traits. A total of 363 alleles was detected with an average of 10.33 alleles per locus and moderately high Nei's allelic/gene diversity (0.502) was detected. Polymorphic information content ranged from 0.685 to 0.987 with an average of 0.901. 34 unique, 236 rare, 84 low-frequency and 44 high-frequency alleles were detected. 53 morphological traits harbored a total of 195 variables with an average of 4.217 variables per trait. 50 out of 53 morphological traits showed polymorphism and highly significant differences among varieties. High genetic diversity was observed among 607 farmers' rice varieties both at molecular (0.653) and phenotypic (0.656) levels. The dendrogram based on both microsatellite markers and morphological traits grouped the 607 farmers' rice varieties into three major groups. A moderate population structure was observed with two independent subpopulations SP1 and SP2, which have membership percentages of 82.6 % and 17.4 %, fixation index values of 0.19 and 0.194, respectively. The AMOVA could explain 63 % of the total variation among varieties and 34 % within varieties. Our results showed that the farmers' rice varieties of Odisha harbored higher levels of both allelic and genetic diversity. Hence, these varieties would be useful for the identification of novel and elite alleles, and serve as a source of donors for the development of climate-smart varieties with improved grain yield and qualities, and input use efficiency, which would be sustainable in changing climate scenario conditions and improve farmers' income.Not Availabl