Beneficial Bacteria To Protect Tomatoes And Promote Their Growth

A discovery by INRS paves the way for more sustainable solutions for producers in Quebec.

Reducing the use of chemical inputs while protecting crops against disease is one of the major challenges of modern agriculture. In tomatoes, bacterial canker is particularly feared because it can cause significant production losses and remains difficult to control.

Professor Éric Déziel of the National Institute of Scientific Research (INRS) has highlighted a promising avenue by identifying beneficial bacteria capable of both promoting plant growth and protecting them against this disease. To achieve this, his team screened more than 500 bacteria isolated from various vegetable fields.

The results of their work were published in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology of the American Society for Microbiology (ASM).

A dual solution for healthy crops
The research team identified three particularly promising bacteria. One of them delayed the onset of disease symptoms by up to seven days in tomato plants exposed to the pathogen and significantly reduced its severity. Two others also demonstrated their ability to protect plants while promoting their growth.

“We have identified bacteria capable of protecting plants against a major disease while promoting their growth. This dual function represents a very interesting potential for more sustainable agriculture,” emphasizes Nasim Sedighian, researcher in environmental microbiology and first author of the study, who carried out this work during her postdoctoral internship at INRS.

Genomic analyses also revealed that two of the strains studied could belong to a new bacterial lineage of the Pseudomonas marginalis group, opening new avenues of research on beneficial microorganisms associated with plants.

Collaborative research rooted in the needs of the community
For more than twenty years, Professor Éric Déziel's laboratory at the INRS Armand-Frappier Health Biotechnology Centre in Laval has been developing recognized expertise on beneficial microorganisms and their applications in agriculture.

“This research illustrates the importance of partnerships between academia and industry to address concrete challenges in the agricultural sector. In the long term, these microorganisms could offer producers new tools to protect their crops more sustainably,” adds Éric Déziel, professor at INRS and holder of the Canada Research Chair in Fundamental and Applied Sociomicrobiology .

Before any potential commercial use, the researcher points out that the strains will need to be evaluated under real production conditions in order to confirm their effectiveness and optimize their use.