Role of Microorganisms in Plant Adaptation Towards Climate Change for Sustainable Agriculture

Plant beneficial microorganisms (PBMs) have a tendency to colonize soil and various parts of plant (especially in root) for augmenting the nutrients in soil as well as secretion of other biomolecules. In either ways PBMs help to improve plant productivity and immunity for increasing tolerance capability or adaptation towards diverse climatic conditions. Although earlier reports have exhibited significant contribution of PBMs for the development of induced systemic resistance against abiotic stresses like low/high temperature, salinity, moisture deficit and acidic conditions. PBMs play crucial role in nutrients transportation from soil to plant that leads to the reduction in application of chemical fertilizers and low accumulation of toxic elements in agricultural lands. Reducing or minimizing the use of chemical fertilizers may also help to decrease the occurrence of contamination by fertilizers and maintains ion balance in soil, as a result soil health will be improved. In addition, exopolysaccharide secretion and biofilm formation by PBMs alter the physico-chemical properties of rhizospheric soil that also impact higher plant response to abiotic stress, such as moisture deficit, metal toxicity, chilling injury, saline, and low/high temperature. PBMs mediated adaptation or tolerance in plants towards different climatic conditions might be accompanied through different mechanisms like induction of cold/heat shock proteins and osmoprotectants. Application of these microorganisms might be effective for alleviation of climate change in various crops, thus developing an emerging approach towards sustainable agriculture. These microorganisms might also be utilized as model to decipher stress tolerance mitigation and responding processes that can be established for crop plants to cope with the stress caused by climate change.