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The Biological Control Possibilities of Seed-Borne Fungi

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Current Trends in Plant Disease Diagnostics and Management Practices

Part of the book series: Fungal Biology ((FUNGBIO))

Abstract

Seed-borne fungi cause various diseases on crops, which reproduce by seeds, and these diseases are spread by seed throughout the countries. The use of alternative control methods such as biological control for suppressing diseases caused by seed-borne fungi have been developing rapidly and are playing an important role in reducing the amounts of pesticides. However, there are few commercial preparations targeted for controlling seed-borne fungi in the market, as compared with those for soil-borne fungi. Most of the studies on biological control of seed-borne fungal diseases have focused on wheat, barley, rice, sorghum, cowpea, soybean, chickpea, pea and bean among the field crops, as well as on muskmelon, cabbage, carrot and onion within the vegetable crops. Different control practices with microorganisms have been used to manage these diseases. Although chemical control is accepted as comparatively simple and inexpensive, successful findings with biocontrol agents are promising for implementation of biological control for seed-borne fungi because of the challenges in chemical control for growers, consumers and the environment. This chapter summarizes the results of experiments conducted in pot and field conditions applying useful microorganisms to seeds naturally or artificially infested with pathogens, and provides an outlook for future research.

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  1. Department of Plant Protection, Faculty of Agriculture, Namık Kemal University, Tekirdağ, 59030, Turkey

    Nuray Özer & Arzu Coşkuntuna

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  1. Nuray Özer
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  2. Arzu Coşkuntuna
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Correspondence to Nuray Özer .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biotechnology Engineering, Ben Gurion University of The Negev, Beersheva, Israel

    Pradeep Kumar

  2. MGBG, Biochemistry, National Univ of Ireland Galway, Galway, Galway, Ireland

    Vijai Kumar Gupta

  3. Uttar Pradesh Council of Sugarcane, Shahjahnapur, Uttar Pradesh, India

    Ajay Kumar Tiwari

  4. Dryland Biotechnology, Ben Gurion University of The Negev, Beersheva, Israel

    Madhu Kamle

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Özer, N., Coşkuntuna, A. (2016). The Biological Control Possibilities of Seed-Borne Fungi. In: Kumar, P., Gupta, V., Tiwari, A., Kamle, M. (eds) Current Trends in Plant Disease Diagnostics and Management Practices. Fungal Biology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-27312-9_17

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