Enhanced rice plant (BRRI-28) growth at lower doses of urea caused by diazinon mineralizing endophytic bacterial consortia and explorations of relevant regulatory genes in a Klebsiella sp. strain HSTU-F2D4R

Endophytic biostimulant with pesticide bioremediation activities may reduce agrochemicals application in rice cultivation. The present study evaluates diazinon-degrading endophytic bacteria, isolated from rice plants grown in the fields with pesticide amalgamation, leading to increased productivity in high-yielding rice plants. These endophytes showed capabilities of decomposing diazinon, confirmed by FT-IR spectra analysis. Growth promoting activities of these endophytes can be attributed to their abilities to produce an increased level of IAA content and to demonstrate high level ACC-deaminase activities. Furthermore, these endophytes demonstrated enhanced level of extracellular cellulase, xylanase, amylase, protease and lignin degrading activities. Five genera including Enterobacter, Pantoea, Shigella, Acinetobacter, and Serratia, are represented only by the leaves, while four genera such as Enterobacter, Escherichia, Kosakonia, and Pseudomonas are represented only by the shoots. Five genera including, Klebsiella, Enterobacter, Pseudomonas, Burkholderia, and Bacillus are represented only by the roots of rice plants. All these strains demonstrated cell wall hydrolytic enzyme activities, except pectinase. All treatments, either individual strains or consortia of strains, enhanced rice plant growth at germination, seedling, vegetative and reproductive stages. Among four (I-IV) consortia, consortium-III generated the maximum rice yield under 70% lower doses of urea compared to that of control (treated with only fertilizer). The decoded genome of Klebsiella sp. HSTU-F2D4R revealed nif-cluster, chemotaxis, phosphates, biofilm formation, and organophosphorus insecticide-degrading genes. Sufficient insecticide-degrading proteins belonging to strain HSTU-F2D4R had interacted with diazinon, confirmed in molecular docking and formed potential catalytic triads, suggesting the strains have bioremediation potential with biofertilizer applications in rice cultivation.