Vigor of Plantlet from Microplantlet Treated by Filtrate and Cell Suspension of Some Isolates of Bacillus and Resistance to Banana Wilt Pathogen after Acclimatization

Abstract

Blood Disease Bacterium (BDB) and Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. cubense (FOC) is a couple wilt pathogen  of  banana.  These pathogens are the most important constraint in cultivation of banana in Indonesia.  In the integrated control strategy of the disease, the use of healthy seedlings produced from tissue culture technique is recommended.  The seedling produced by tissue culture technique however leads to lower vigor and susceptibility to the disease due to the aseptic work in vitro causing the beneficial bacterial endophytic to be eliminated. Therefore, the utility of the beneficial endophytic bacteria should be studied for recovering the vigor and resistance of the seedling.     Three isolates of endophytic Bacillus (B04, B05, B10) have been effective as growth promoter of microplantlet and antagonist of BDB and FOC in vitro.   Here then, this article reports the study results of the vigor of the plantlet (treated microplantlet by filtrate or cell suspension of the Bacillus) after 3 months in acclimatization. The results were similar to the previous results on microplantlet in vitro, that Bacillus isolates B04, B05, and B10 were capable of promoting the growth and inducing the resistance to wilt pathogens on banana plantlets.  The treatments with bacterial cell inoculums were more effective than those bacterial filtrate. Isolate B10 was most potential followed by B05 and B04 respectively.