Detoxification of oxalic acid by Pseudomonas fluorescens during wilt disease condition in chickpea plant

The phytotoxic activity of pathogenic fungi may reside in the structurally simple secondary metabolites, such as organic acids and their derivatives like oxalic acids (Berestetskiy, 2008). The oxalic acid content was found to be an indicator for development of wilt in chickpea. It proved the pathogenicity of Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. ciceri which caused wil t in chickpea. I ts ro le in pathogenicity is for lowering the pH at the infection site to allow for optimal cell wall degradation by fungal enzymes to weaken the plant cell wall barrier (Bakkeren and Gold, 2004). Its phytotoxic activity has been known for years and it has been implicated as a virulent factor for several phytopathogenic fungi.In contrast to this, ABSTRACT