Chemical Sciences

Contributions by CSIR-IHBT -Through years of extensive survey and sustained RD, CSIR-IHBTidentified several novel soil microbes from unique Himalayan niches with scientifically proven plant growth promoting attributes: Efficient phosphate solubilization , Enhanced siderophore production , High auxin production and ACC-deaminase activity , Stress tolerance against desiccation, acidity and alkalinity, salinity, low and high temperature regimes . These microbes have been fully characterized and their potential have been successfully tested under multilocational trials at farmers' field and experimental plots spanning across Himachal Pradesh and Punjab in several economically important crops like potato, garlic, onion and pea. These microbes act as stress buster and enhance crop yield further improving soil fertility. Cost effective technologies have been standardized for developing bioformulations of these microbes with shelf life of about six months.