Biodiversity of psychrotrophic microbes and their biotechnological applications

ABSTRACT

The extreme cold environments harbor novel psychrotrophic microbes. The psychrotrophic microbes have been reportedas plant growth promoters and biocontrol agents for sustainable agriculture, in industry as cold-adapted hydrolyticenzymes and in medicine as secondary metabolites and pharmaceutical important bioactive compounds. Inoculationwith psychrotrophic/psychrotolerant strains significantly enhanced root/shoot biomass and nutrients uptake as comparedto non-bacterized control. The psychrotrophic microbes play important role in alleviation of cold stress in plant growingat high hill and low temperature and conditions. The psychrotrophic microbes have been reported from worldwidefrom cold habitats and belong to all three domain archaea, bacteria, and eukarya including different phylum such asActinobacteria, Ascomycota, Bacteroidetes, Basidiomycota, Chloroflexi, Chlamydiae, Planctomycetes, Cyanobacteria,Euryarchaeota, Firmicutes, Gemmatimonadetes, Verrucomicrobia, Mucoromycota, Proteobacteria, Spirochaetes,Thaumarchaeota and Nitrospirae. The most dominant genera belong to Arthrobacter, Bacillus, Exiguobacterium,Paenibacillus, Providencia, Pseudomonas, and Serratia have been reported from the cold habitats. The Psychrotrophicmicrobes have biotechnological applications in agriculture, medicine, industry, food, and allied sectors