LAUSR

The effectiveness of non-chemical control methods is a critical point of the research about the development of alternatives to banned and/or unsustainable fungicides. In order to extend the magnitude and/or the spectrum of the control ability of each component, the combination of different tools has been proposed. In this work, glucosinolate-containing Brassica carinata seed meal, combined with essential oils from different aromatic plants and the antagonistic bacteria Bacillus amyloliquefaciens strain 17S, was assayed for the control of the soil-borne phytopathogens Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. lycopersici, Rhizoctonia solani and Sclerotinia minor. Seed meal and essential oils showed significant dose-dependent antifungal effects towards all three pathogens, being able to completely inhibit growth at the highest concentration tested. Moreover, the combination of meal and thyme oil enhanced in vitro antagonistic activity of the B. amyloliquefaciens strain by 37%, on average. The use of these three components in planta experiments revealed that the three-combined treatments proved, in general, high level of biocontrol ability (around 80%), but not better than the treatments on their own in reducing disease levels on Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. lycopersici/tomato and Sclerotinia minor/lettuce pathosystems, except for Rhizoctonia solani on bean.