Effects of increased nitrate availability on the control of plant pathogenic fungi by the soil bacterium Bacillus subtilis

In wet soils, low oxygen conditions often develop that favour disease development by many soil-borne plant pathogens. The introduction of a biocontrol agent, to suppress disease development, would require that the agent remains metabolically active under such conditions. Denitrifying bacteria can maintain this metabolic activity by switching to nitrate respiration. In the rhizosphere, plant roots not only supply carbon as an electron donor, but also cause a localised lowering of oxygen concentrations, conditions favourable for nitrate respiration. Two strains of Bacillus subtilis, showing strong inhibition of a number of pathogenic fungi on agar plates, and the capacity to grow under anoxic and anaerobic conditions when provided with nitrate, were used to study the possible involvement of nitrate respiration in fungal disease control. The effect of the addition of nitrate on the activity of these antagonistic strains was studied under anoxic conditions using the sealed plate method of Fiddaman and Rossal [Fiddaman, P.J., Rossal, S., 1995. Plant Pathol. 44, 695–703]. The assay tests the activity, measured as a reduction in fungal growth, of antifungal volatiles (AFV) produced by the bacteria. The in vitro experiments showed that antagonism by the B. subtilis strains towards Fusarium oxysporum varied under anoxic conditions, depending on the nitrate availability and agar used as a growth medium. AFV activity was increased by the presence of nitrate in the medium at concentrations of 10 mM or more. Nitrate respiration may therefore have an important role in the control of fungal root diseases by allowing denitrifying soil-borne bacteria to remain metabolically active in wet soils with low oxygen concentrations. © 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.