Description:
This book discusses the role of salt in current agricultural approaches, including the low salt tolerance of agricultural crops and trees, impact of saline soils, and salt-resistant plants.
Halophytes are extremely salt tolerant plants, which are able to grow and survive under salt at concentrations as high as 5 g/l by maintaining negative water potential. The salt-tolerant microbes inhabiting the rhizospheres of halophytes may contribute to their salt tolerance, and the rhizospheres of halophytic plants provide an ideal opportunity for isolating various groups of salt-tolerant microbes that could enhance the growth of different crops under salinity stress.
The book offers an overview of salt-tolerant microbes' ability to increase plant tolerance to salt to facilitate plant growth, the potential of the halophytes' rhizospheres as a reservoir of beneficial salt-tolerant microbes, their future application as bio-inoculants in agriculture and a valuable resource for an alternative way of improving crop tolerance to salinity and promoting saline soil-based agriculture. This special collection of reviews highlights some of the recent advances in applied aspects of plant (halophytes)-microbe interactions and their contribution towards eco-friendly approaches saline soil-based agriculture.