0.002 g/l and glucose 5 g/l in double distilled water (Celar and Valic,
2005)) sterilized (autoclaved at 121°C for 18 min) in 250 ml conical
flasks and incubated at 25±1°C on a rotary shaker set at 100 rpm
for 14 days. The control conical flasks were inoculated with five
discs of 5 mm diameter sterile PDA medium. After incubation, the
culture was filtered through millipore filter in order to remove
mycelia mats and then sterilized by passing through 0.2 m pore
biological membrane filter (FP30/0.2 CA-S, Schleeicher and Schuell
Micro Science GmbH). One hundred maize surface seeds were
disinfected by immersion in 0.5% hypochlorite sodium (NaClO) for 5
min before being rinsed and washed thoroughly in sterile distilled
water thrice in a laminar air flow cabinet, placed on a sterile blotting
paper in sterile dishes and watered with 10 ml of the filtrate. Two
control sets were conducted. In one of the control treatments, 10 ml
sterile distilled water and 10 ml non-inoculated medium in the other
control were used. The Petri dishes were then sealed with parafilm
and incubated in a growth chamber at 25±1°C and 80% relative
humidity. Percentage of seed germination was counted 48, 72 and
96 h after incubation as well as the rootlet and coleoptiles length
was measured after 96 h passed. The experimental design used
was completely randomized (CRD) with four replicates.