Endophyte Biotechnology

Book excerpt: Most plants are colonized by endophytes: bacterial and fungal microorganisms, without visible disease symptoms. With state-of-the-art knowledge on their discovery, qualities and roles, this book describes endophyte diversity, their value, exploitation and future challenges. It explains how beneficial endophytes colonize plants, and how they might help mitigate climate change effects, assist pest control and interact with mycorrhizal fungi to boost yield. Endophytes can facilitate the access to nutrients, produce particular metabolites, and change the plant's chemistry, physiology and (defense) responses. Endophyte biosynthetic pathways can, alone or in combination with the plant's, yield novel chemicals, with yet-to-be-discovered pharmacological characteristics as well. The book describes how functional metagenomics can explore and boost yields of useful endophyte products.