Global Scenario of Advance Fungal Research in Crop Protection

Abstract

Sustainable agriculture is the only solution in providing food security to the evergrowing population of the world. Sustainable agriculture requires limited use of harmful chemical insecticides and implementation of sustainable methods like use of biopesticides for biocontrol. Fungi mediate biocontrol of insects, soil borne pathogens, weeds, and nematodes and the different mechanisms used by fungi for biocontrol are antagonism, antibiosis, and competition. Understanding the biology and biocontrol mechanisms of fungi at molecular level requires sequencing of the genome and also analyzing the genome. There are five next generation sequencing technologies available to generate NGS data: first, second, third, fourth, and fifth generation sequencing technologies. Better understanding of the fungal genomes will help in improving biocontrol. This requires understanding the ongoing genome sequencing projects and also projects other than sequencing like epigenome projects, transcriptome projects, proteome projects, etc. Biocontrol also requires understanding the synergistic actions between different biocontrol agents, between biocontrol agents and PGPR, and advances in the formulation of biocontrol agents as products. Therefore, this review provides information on biocontrol agents, mechanism of biocontrol, NGS technologies used to generate NGS data, genome sequencing projects, synergistic actions between different biocontrol agents, between biocontrol agents and PGPR, and advances in the formulation of biocontrol agents. This information provides insights on global scenario of advance fungal research in biocontrol or crop protection.