Isolation and identification of Soil Fungi from Wheat Cultivated Area of Uttar Pradesh

Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) is one of the most important cereals in the world and is part of a staple diet for nearly 35% of the world’s population. It is grown in about 102 countries of the world covering about220.69 million hectares of land which is 32% of the total cultivated land of the world. The area and production increased to 0.83 million hectare and 1.84 million metric tons, respectively in 2000.

Soil fungi play an important role as major decomposers in the soil ecosystem. There are about 75,000 species of soil fungi in the world. Fungi are one of the dominant groups present in soil, which strongly influence ecosystem structure and functioning and thus plays a key role in many ecological services. Therefore, there is a growing interest in assessing soil biodiversity and its biological functioning.The yield was 2.8 t/ha in 2011-2012cropping year which is very low compared to those in the research farm level(3.5 t/ha to 5.1 t/ha). Coupled with many other factors, diseases also play an important role in lowering the yield .The process of decomposition is governed by the succession of fungi at various stage of decomposition nutrient level of soil, crop residue and prevailing environmental conditions.The current study was aimed detection of soil fungi from wheat field. The study involved isolation, identification and screening of soil fungi of fungal species prevailed Allahabad, Varanasi, and Mirzapur districts of Uttar Pradesh in India.