Role of growth elicitors and microbes in stress management and sustainable production of Sorghum

Sorghum (Sorghum bicolor L. Moench) is an important tropical species of the Poaceae family with wide distribution in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. It is one of the significant cereal crops that is being cultivated widely across the world with diversified applications in various fields such as agriculture, beverage, and food industries. Because of its high nutritious values, it is being consumed as a source of carbohydrate by human beings, as an animal feed, and also utilized as a raw material by alcoholic and other industries. Hence, on the basis of everincreasing human population size and most countries policies aimed at improving the processing and industrial usage of sorghum, the demand for its cultivation is rising in all the developing countries. On the other hand, the crop plants are facing the stressful environmental changes that are considerably affecting the metabolism, growth, and yield of Sorghum. In recent times, it has been observed that microbes and growth elicitors plays an important role in alleviating the plants response to stressful conditions. In view of this background, the present review paper provides an overview of the literature available on the role of growth elicitors and microbes that can increase the tolerance levels of Sorghum towards environmental stresses.