Biodiversity Studies of Fungal Endophytes of Cucurbitaceous Plants Reddy M. Gurivi*, Prabhukarthikeyan S. R., Murugeshwari S Department of Plant Pathology, Centre for Plant Protection Studies, Tamil Nadu Agriculture University, Coimbatore- 641003 *Email: gurivisony@gmail.com
Online published on 24 December, 2014. Abstract Fungal endophytes are in planta assemblages that occupy the endosphere not accidentally, but in all probability selected for this niche, by their host plants. They offer great scope for novel metabolites for bioprospecting in agriculture. In a biodiversity survey conducted during 2012 in Tamil Nadu, a total number of 18 fungal endophytes have been isolated; of which 11 were from cucumber, two isolates in each category were from pumpkin and snack gourd; one isolate in each category was from ash gourd, ridge gourd and bitter gourd respectively. Five of the endophytic isolates viz., EP4, EP7, EP9, EP10 and EP14 have been confirmed to be Chaetomium sp.; three viz., EP1, EP11 and EP18 belonged to Alternaria sp.; two namely, EP6 and EP13 resembled Trichoderma sp.; and one isolate EP2 matched with an Aspergillus sp. Top Keywords Fugal endophytes, Biodiversity, Isolation, Variability. Top |