A Comparative Study on Different Media Substrates for Mass Production of Entomopathogenic Fungi Beauveria bassiana Meerut (U.P.) Isolate

¹Punia Gudia*, ²Tandan Neeraj, ²Yadav Ashwani, ³Prasad CS
¹Department of Microbiology, Shri Venkateshwara University, Gajraula, India
²Scientific and Applied Research Centre, Meerut, India
³Registrar, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel University of Agriculture and Technology, Meerut, India

A B S T R A C T
The production of locally isolated (Meerut Isolate) Entomopathogenic fungi in suitable media for large scale application has not yet been studied, therefore, the present study was undertaken to evaluate grains, pulses, oilseeds and liquid media such as Potato Dextrose Broth and Sabouraud’s Dextrose Broth for the mass production of B. bassiana. Studies revealed that dry weight of Meerut (UP) isolate varied from 0.623 g to 0.811 g on different media. Growth on broth media indicated maximum dry matter production in chickpea (0.811 g) followed by SDB (0.802 g) > pea (0.796) > soybean (0.751 g) > cowpea (0.715 g) > PDB (0.711) > urd (0.663 g) > lentil (0.623 g) and groundnut (0.582 g) .Significant differences in conidial count were observed on maize, paddy, sorghum, rice and chickpea. Whereas, no significant difference was observed among rice, lentil, pea and soybean. And highest conidial count (8.97 × 10⁷ conidia ml^-1) was observed on cowpea broth followed by soybean (8.00 × 10⁷) and  pea (8.00 × 10⁷) > Rice (7.7 × 10⁷) > lentil (7.6× 10⁷) = Groundnut (7.6× 10⁷) > SDB (7.3 × 107) > urd (6.8× 10⁷) and chickpea broth (6.2 × 10⁷).
Keywords: Entomopathogenic Fungi , B.bassiana, Mass Production