Characterization of Aneurinibacillus aneurinilyticus Strain CKMV1 as a Plant Growth Promoting Rhizobacteria

A bacterial collection of approximately thirty native strains were isolated from rhizosphere soil associated with the seedlings of Valeriana jatamansi grown in moist temperate forest located in and around Chamba district of Himachal Pradesh. The strain CKMV1 showed PGP traits like, phosphate solubilization (257.0 mg l⁻¹), indole acetic acid (7.0 μ gml⁻¹) and siderophore production (53.43%) at 35±2ºC. Besides, the strain also exhibited growth on nitrogen free medium, hydrogen cyanide production and antifungal activity against different fungal pathogens. Significant growth inhibition of fungal pathogens occurred in the order as S. rolfsii > R. solani > D. necatrix > Alternaria spp.> F. oxysporum. The results suggested that the rhizosphere of native V. jatamansi growing in their natural habitat of Chamba district of H.P. is a rich source of Bacillus sp., which have potential to be used in the future as PGP inoculants to improve crop productivity. Morphological, biochemical and molecular based characterization of a selected isolate CKMV1, based on sequence homology of a partial 1375-bp fragment of 16S rDNA amplicon with the ribosomal database sequence validated the strain as Aneurinibacillus aneurinilyticus. Therefore, these results suggested that out of 30 isolates, Aneurinibacillus aneurinilyticus strain CKMV1 possessed multiple PGP traits thus can be further explored for its efficacy as effective PGPR.

30 phosphate (P)- solubilizing bacterial isolates were isolated from Valariana jatamansi and four were selected and examined for their multiple plant growth promoting traits.

Strain CKMV1 showed maximum plant growth promoting traits in lab conditions and therefore it was characterized based on phenotypic and genotypic parameters.

Strain CKMV1 was identified as Aneurinibacillus aneurinilyticus.

It was for the first time that a P-solubilizing Aneurinibacillus aneurinilyticus strain having multiple PGP traits was isolated from the rhizosphere of V. jatamansi.