Functional Potential of Plant Microbiome for Sustainable Agriculture in Conditions of Abiotic Stresses

Abstract

The growth and yield of crop plants are threatened by a variety of factors like soil and irrigation water quality, climate change, and abiotic and biotic stresses. Among these, abiotic stresses like drought, salinity and metal(loid)s, such as arsenic (As) and cadmium (Cd) constitute three major constraints inducing huge yield losses and quality deterioration of crop produce throughout the world. To enable plants to combat these stresses and to obtain sustainable increases in crop yields, the help is required from its associated microorganisms. Microbiome constitutes all microorganisms intricately linked to plants in above and below-ground part of plants. Microbiomes affect plant growth, development, and yield both in normal and under-stressed conditions via several mechanisms. These effects include changes in bioavailability of essential and toxic metal(loid)s, nitrogen fixation, phosphate solubilization, phytohormone synthesis, and water uptake. The microbiome functions like an extended genome of plants and these microbial associations change dynamically in presence of stress and also influence the effect of stresses on plants in reverse. The research on this dynamic microbe–plant interaction has yielded valuable mechanistic information and identified potential microbes that can be used to achieve sustainable crop production in coming years. The present chapter discusses microbiome and its role in abiotic stresses. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2023.