Abstract
Fritillaria taipaiensis is a valuable traditional Chinese medicinal plant affected by germplasm degradation during cultivation. To find a suitable solution for this problem, F. taipaiensis was inoculated with exogenous arbuscular mycorrhiza (AM) fungi, potassium-solubilizing bacteria, and phosphorus-solubilizing bacteria in pot experiments. The effects of inoculation on the AM colonization, photosynthetic pigment, and superoxide dismutase contents, rhizospheric enzyme activities, alkaloid, and nucleotide content of F. taipaiensis were studied. The results showed that the inoculation increased mycorrhizal infection intensity of F. taipaiensis. Compared to the control group, the photosynthetic pigment contents in the leaf of the inoculation groups were increased; the content of soluble protein, the activities of the superoxide dismutase, catalase, and peroxidase in leaves were all significantly increased, and the content of malondialdehyde was decreased. The microbial inoculum also increased the content of active ingredients in F. taipaiensis bulbs and increased the enzyme activities, total microorganism number, bacteria/fungi, and actinomycetes/fungi ratios in the rhizosphere. To sum up, microbial fertilizer can significantly improve the rhizospheric environment and medicinal quality of F. taipaiensis. This research provides a theoretical basis and experimental evidence for the sustainable development of an F. taipaiensis industry.
Highlights
Fritillaria taipaiensis is a perennial herb in the Liliaceae
The two AM fungi species applied in this study were from the Glomeromycetes, which is a main group of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi: Claroideoglomus claroideum from the Claroideoglomeraceae family and Racocetra coreoidea from the Gigasporaceae family, both of them widely used in promoting the growth of plants [38]
This study revealed a symbiotic relationship between 3-year-old F. taipaiensis and the beneficial microorganisms in the rhizospheric soil
Summary
Fritillaria taipaiensis is a perennial herb in the Liliaceae. Its bulbs contain multiple alkaloids, which can cool down body temperature, relieve cough and asthma, and resolve phlegm [1]. The geographical distribution, morphological characteristics, active ingredients, pharmacological effects, and clinical efficacy of F. taipaiensis are similar to those of Fritillaria cirrhosa (Chuanbeimu) [1,2,3], known as “antitussive medicine”. F. taipaiensis has been categorized as a medical material provenance of Chuanbeimu in the 2015 edition of Chinese Pharmacopoeia [4]. Due to the increasing market demand, wild resources of F. taipaiensis are continuously declining, as the herb has been associated with a long growth cycle and over-excavation. Wild F. taipaiensis has been listed as China’s third-level national conservation plant [5,6].
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