Mycoherbicide Research for Controlling Weeds: Status, Opportunities and Future Needs

Mycoherbicide offer an innovative approach to the management of weeds using formulated fungal phytopathogens or their crude metabolite extracts would serve as an important component in integrated management strategy. The biological control of weeds by mycoherbicide (fungal weed pathogens/metabolites) has received considerable academic consideration, only a few commercial products are available. This review article explains the management of weeds with the native microbes and their metabolites isolated from their native weeds. The present weed management in agriculture mainly depends on synthetic herbicides, which cause environmental pollution, restricted choice of succeeding crops and long residual activity. The herbicide industry is continuously searching for identification and characterization of most effective, economical and environmentally safer synthetic herbicides by screening large number of synthetic organic molecules, synthesizing analogs of patent herbicides, designing new herbicide molecules based on target site approach and screening of natural products for herbicidal activity. The herbicidal properties of fungi can be exploited successfully as a tool for the management of weeds. Large number of secondary metabolites produced by fungi provides eco-friendly, diverse and challenging chemical structures. There are numerous reviews has published about mycoherbicide and mycoherbicidal agents were showing intense scientific and commercial interest in this field. Here, we attempt in this review to show that the mycoherbicide field has indeed grown significantly and future research needs.