Role of Microbial Volatile Compounds in Plant Growth and Health

Dear Colleagues,

Microbial volatile compounds are a very diverse group of metabolites with reduced molecular weight that volatilize at room temperature. They can act as molecular signals in the communication among microorganisms and even as inter-kingdom signals in the communication between microorganisms and their hosts. Bacteria have coevolved with plants, establishing close relationships that may be beneficial or harmful to these plants; it is known that plants receive many benefits from their microbiomes.

Current studies have shown that several microbial volatile compounds alter phytohormone signaling, transduction vies, and plant gene expression, thereby modulating plant organogenesis, and triggering defense mechanisms and responses to nutrient deficiencies. Thus, these studies indicate how microbial volatile compounds participate in plant growth and health. However, despite the valuable and growing information published in recent years, certain challenges and questions remain to be resolved. These include topics related to new plant growth, inducing microbial volatiles, plant sensing systems of microbial volatiles, interactions of microbial volatile compounds with phytoregulators and signaling vies involved, mechanisms of action of microbial volatiles on plant defense and plant growth, ecological or physiological relevance of plant growth inducing microbial volatiles, new experimental approaches to the topic, and new strategies to employ microbial volatiles in plant production. This Special Issue aims to focus on all these aforementioned topics.

Dr. Eduardo Valencia-Cantero
Guest Editor

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• volatile organic compounds (VOCs)
• plant–microbe interactions
• plant receptors of microbial volatile compounds
• phytoregulator–microbial volatile compounds interactions
• microbial volatile compounds in plant defense
• ecological relevance of microbial volatile compounds
• microbial volatile compounds in plant production
• methods in microbial volatile compounds study