Diversity of wild legumes and associated rhizobia in the coastal regions of Andaman

Abstract

The present study was undertaken to uncover the diversity of root nodulating Rhizobium and associated wild legumes growing in coastal regions of Bay Islands. The exploration of coastal areas of South Andaman showed occurrence of 5 unique wild legumes and in that two viz., Vigna marina and Mucuna monosperma were found to grow in seashore areas. The earlier had abundant canopy and pods even under submergence of sea water during high tide and the second one was capable of growing in the backwater of sea. Results show that the five Rhizobum isolates associated with these wild legumes exhibit similar kind of reaction to various biochemical test with few exceptions. Among the isolates WL1 and WL12 associated with V. marina and M. monosperma, respectively showed high salt tolerance and that grew up to 1000mM NaCl in vitro, which is unique finding.