Impacts of Agriculture on the Environment and Soil Microbial Biodiversity.

Agriculture represents an important mechanism in terms of reducing plant, animal, and microbial biodiversity and altering the environment. The pressure to cope with the increasing food demands of the human population has intensified the environmental impact, and alternative ways to produce food are required in order to minimize the decrease in biodiversity. Conventional agricultural practices, such as floods and irrigation systems; the removal of undesired vegetation by fires, tilling, and plowing; the use of herbicides, fertilizers, and pesticides; and the intensification of these practices over the last 50 years, have led to one of the most important environmental threats-a major loss of biodiversity.

Actinobacteria Associated With Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Spores, Taxonomic Characterization and Their Beneficial Traits to Plants: Evidence Obtained From Mung Bean () and Thai Jasmine Rice ().

In this study, we report on the isolation of actinobacteria obtained from spores of and provide evidence for their potential in agricultural uses as plant growth promoters and . Actinobacteria were isolated from spores of using the dilution plate technique and media designed for the selective isolation of members of specific actinobacterial taxa. Six strains namely 48, S1, S3, S4, S4-1 and SP, were isolated and identified based on16S rRNA gene sequences.