DOI: https://doi.org/10.36347/sajb.2026.v14i01.005

Pages: 93-102

Background: Effective plant disease management is still one of the major concerns in Agriculture based countries like India. Meanwhile the use of chemical fungicides to tackle them raises environmental and health concerns. The excessive use of chemical fungicides also contributes to increase in soil salinity posing another threat to crop production. In saline environments the efficiency of the fungicides reduces remarkably due to osmotic interactions. This compels us to find novel and extremophilic biocontrol strategies which can work under the adverse conditions. Halophilic fungi, living in hypersaline conditions can be exploited for such reasons. Methodology: Lonar Lake, a unique crater ecosystem, in Buldhana district of Maharashtra, India is a home for such halophilic fungi. Water and Sediment samples were collected. Halophilic Fungi were isolated by using serial dilution on selected media. These were supplemented with varying NaCl concentrations. The isolated fungi were identified as Aspergillus species and Penicillin species via morphological characterization. The antagonistic activity of selected halophilic fungi fungal isolates (HFI) was assessed against soil borne plant pathogen viz. F oxyporum, R. solani and M. phaseolina by dual culture assay under 5% and 10% salinity. Percentage Growth Inhibition (PGI %) was calculated for the quantification of antagonistic potential. Results: Total 48 halophilic fungal isolates were obtained from sediment and water samples from Lonar Lake. These isolates exhibited diverse colonial morphology and pigmentation. The dual culture assay displayed the significant inhibitory potential against the tested pathogens. Few isolates demonstrated exceptional PGI% values more than 70% against F. oxyporum and R solani under 10% NaCl and the highest antagonism up to 82% PGI against M. phaseolina at 10% NaCl. Conclusion: The halophilic fungi from lunar lake are promising biocontrol agents towards the Plant Disease Control insulin habitats