Abstract: Plant growth promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR) shows an important role in the sustainable agriculture industry. The increasing demand for crop production with a significant reduction of synthetic chemical fertilizers and pesticides use is a big challenge nowadays. The use of PGPR has been proven to be an environmentally sound way of increasing crop yields by facilitating plant growth through either a direct or indirect mechanism. The mechanisms of PGPR include regulating hormonal and nutritional balance, inducing resistance against plant pathogens, and solubilizing nutrients for easy uptake by plants. In addition, PGPR show synergistic and antagonistic interactions with microorganisms within the rhizosphere and beyond in bulk soil, which indirectly boosts plant growthrate. TherearemanybacteriaspeciesthatactasPGPR,describedintheliteratureassuccessful for improving plant growth. However, there is a gap between the mode of action (mechanism) of the PGPR for plant growth and the role of the PGPR as biofertilizer—thus the importance of nano-encapsulationtechnologyinimprovingtheefficacyofPGPR.Hence,thisreviewbridgesthegap mentioned and summarizes the mechanism of PGPR as a biofertilizer for agricultural sustainability.
Keywords: biofertilizer;plantgrowthpromotingrhizobacteria(PGPR);plant-microbes;plantgrowth; nano-encapsulation technology