microbial-inoculants
Microbial inoculants are preparations of beneficial microorganisms introduced to soil or plant tissues to enhance plant health and growth. These microbes improve nutrient availability through nitrogen fixation and phosphorus solubilization, while also strengthening plant disease resistance and stress tolerance. By leveraging natural microbial-plant interactions, inoculants offer sustainable alternatives to synthetic inputs in agriculture and represent a key approach in managing plant productivity and resilience.
PubMed · 2026-04-22
Combining beneficial soil bacteria with a supplement called N-acetylcysteine (NAC) significantly reduced lead absorption in wheat plants and boosted their growth under contaminated conditions. The paired treatment outperformed either approach alone, cutting the amount of lead that moved into plant tissues and improving plant health across multiple measures.
Combined treatment (microbes + NAC) increased wheat root length by 46.9% and total chlorophyll by 45.6% compared to lead-stressed, untreated plants.
The fraction of lead accumulating in the plant (bioconcentration factor) dropped from 0.74 in untreated plants to 0.58 with combined treatment, and the fraction moving to above-ground parts (translocation factor) fell from 0.16 to 0.095.
Seed germination and viability increased by 20.7% and 27.7% respectively with combined treatment, while oxidative damage markers like hydrogen peroxide and malondialdehyde declined significantly.
