Plant associated microorganisms with silica solubilization potential

Abstract

Silicon is the second abundant element on Earth. Commonly, it is found as silica and silicates, or in biology as mineral constituent of microorganisms, protozoa and plants. Although silicon it is not considered an essential nutrient for plants, it has been noticed that available silicon positively influences plants’ growth, mechanical strength, and resistance to several biotic and abiotic unfavorable conditions, such as fungal phytopathogens, herbivores and adverse chemicals. Our study presents several microbial strains able to solubilize silicon from different biological and mineral substrates. Some of these microorganisms were isolated from plant material with high content of mineral silicon like horsetail, wheat straw, rosemary and nettle. Moreover, microbial supernatant obtainedon horsetail broth increased hypocotyl and roots length of cowpea Vignaunguiculata (L.) Walp.