ABSTRACT
The expected climate change along with soil nutrient imbalance, intensive and unjudicial use of chemical fertilizers, organic contaminations, and heavy metal pollutants are becoming a great concern worldwide. Moreover, the unfavorable climatic conditions further aggravate such situations. The beneficial application of plant-microbe interactions in contaminated agro-ecosystems management is gaining increasing attention as it successfully contribute to detoxify contaminated environments and enhance the crop productivity and environmental sustainability. The present chapter outlines the mechanism of plant-microbe interactions to maintain a sustainable agriculture as biofertilizer, phytoremediator, and biocontrol agent or pathogens inhibitor. Practical approach should therefore integrate the functional indigenous microbial communities as well as functional plants. The use of biotechnological and molecular tools to enhance the overall efficiency and performance of this association is also discussed. The improved understanding of microbes-plant-synergism will further help us in solving this issue in a better way. The current contribution gives a comprehensive review on plant-microbe interactions in agro-ecosystem management.
