M. Hesam Shahrajabian

• PhD
• Senior Researcher at Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences

Greetings We are organizing a Special Issue entitled “The Role of Soil Microorganisms in Enhancing the Efficiency of Medicinal and Aromatic plants", to be published in the journal Horticulturae. With your distinguished expertise in this area, we invite you to consider submitting one manuscript to this special issue. The submission deadline is 1 December 2025.

About the Special Issue:

This Special Issue aims to focus on the functions and roles of different types of microbes and their interactions with medicinal and aromatic plants through a number of direct or indirect mechanisms, and how the plant–microbe interaction acts on plant growth, what mechanisms are used to survive under stressful environmental conditions, and how the interaction and abiotic parameters can interfere with the success of microbial inoculation in plants, acting as a basis for studies on the plant–microorganism interaction. This Special Issue also aims to consider how microbiota affects the internal and external microenvironment of medicinal plants and herbs, and how microbiota enhances the efficacy and quality of medicinal plants such as Chinese herbal medicines. Therefore, the relationship and interaction between the microenvironment and herbal medicines can be explained.

Special Issue Website:

Here is a brief introduction to Horticulturae (https://www.mdpi.com/journal/horticulturae):

1. A journal in MDPI with full open access publishing style;

2. Horticulturae is indexed by SCIE and Scopus (Q1 in the ‘Horticulture’ Category);

3. Rapid Publication: A first decision is provided to authors approximately 14.6 days after submission.

4. An Article Processing Charge (APC) of CHF 2200 currently applies to all accepted papers.

If you are interested in contributing a paper, please kindly send us back a few words about your submission plans within the next two weeks.

Thank you for your consideration.

Guest Editors,

Prof. Dr. Wenli Sun

Dr. Mohamad Hesam Shahrajabian

Dear Respected Scientists and Scholars

We are leading a Special Issue of the journal Plants on the subject of "Advanced Research on Rhizosphere Microorganisms: Plant–Microbial Interactions and Sustainable Agriculture". Based on your expertise in this field, we would like to invite you to contribute a review or full research paper for peer-review and possible publication in this Special Issue. Your paper will have 20% discount. Wewill also treat your paper as a "Feature Paper".

For further information about this Special Issue, please see:

For information on manuscript preparation and related matters, please see the instructions for authors:

Although the deadline for manuscript submission is 30 April 2025, we would appreciate hearing from you in the next few weeks as to whether you are interested in submitting a paper in order to help with the planning.

Best regards,

Dr. Mohamad Hesam Shahrajabian

Dr. Spyridon A. Petropoulos

Dr. Wenli Sun

--

/Plants/ (ISSN 2223-7747) is an open access journal that covers all key areas of plant science, supported by an outstanding Editorial Board composed of high-profile researchers (https://www.mdpi.com/journal/plants/editors). The current IF is 4.0. It ranks Q1 in the category 'Plant Sciences'.

Springer Nature is launching a new series of open access journals, the journal "Discover Sustainability" being one of them. Discover Sustainability is a completely open access journal, which means that its contents are freely available and can be accessed by a world audience.

I am currently serving as a Guest Editor and would like to invite you and your team to contribute to my Topical Collection titled " Plant Growth-Promoting Microorganisms (PGPMs): Applications and Mechanisms in Sustainable Agricultural, Horticultural Sciences and Soil Science ". I believe that your research would be a great fit for this Topical Collection.

[Short instruction for the TC]

The submission deadline for this collection is 31/10/2024. You can submit your manuscript any time before that, and all articles published by Discover Sustainability are made freely and permanently accessible online immediately upon publication. You can access the Topical Collection homepage via the following link:

To submit your manuscript for consideration at Discover Sustainability as part of this Topical Collection, please follow the steps detailed on this Submission Guidelines. When submitting a manuscript, you will need to indicate that you are submitting your manuscript to a Collection. To do so, on the ‘Topical Collection Name " Topical Collection from the drop-down list. Authors should also express their interest in the Collection in their cover letter.

If this Call for Participation receives your favorable consideration, we look forward to our future collaboration.

Best wishes,

Dr. M. H. Shahrajabian

Special Issue Information

Plant microbial interactions can be done through various numbers of direct and indirect mechanisms such as nutrient transfer (stemming from vitamin or siderophore production; enzymatic decomposition of litter in soil; atmospheric nitrogen fixation; conversion of inorganic minerals to soluble components, especially phosphorous), direct stimulation of growth via phytohormones such as indole acetic acid and ethylene, mitigation of salt stress, and antagonism toward pathogenic microorganisms. Microbial diversity has been directly linked to above-ground diversity in a number of agricultural, horticultural, and natural settings. Diverse components released by different parts of the root system create a wonderful and unique environment in the surrounding soil, which is known as the rhizosphere. These components are termed as root exudates and belong to three main groups: high-molecular weight, low-molecular weight, and volatile organic compounds. The types of microorganisms within a rhizosphere include fungi, bacteria, algae, and actinomycetes. Microorganisms and their products also influence the roots in a variety of negative, positive, and neutral ways. Interestingly, microbial density was proved to non-linearly influence plant production, while increasing microbial density has been shown to boost plant biomass. Microorganisms take an active role in the growth of specific species using hormone production, as indoleacetic acid, or indole-3-acetic acid, is a plant hormone produced in the apex or buds and new leaves of young plants. In addition to decreasing stress effects, plant–microbial interactions affect the plant disease state or diversity of soil pathogens. Free-living microbes including filamentous fungi of the genus Trichoderma and a variety of plant growth-promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR) are able to suppress soil-borne plant pathogens and stimulate plant growth by various direct or indirect mechanisms, such as production of mycoparasitism, phytohormones, and competence with plant pathogens; decomposition; and mineralization of organic matter and increasing the bioavailability of mineral nutrients such as iron and phosphorus. This Special Issue focuses on the functions and roles of different types of microbes and their interactions with plants through a number of direct or indirect mechanisms, as well as how plant–microbe interactions act on plant growth, what mechanisms they use to survive under stressful environmental conditions, and how the interactions and abiotic parameters can interfere with the success of microbial inoculation in plants, acting as a basis for studies on plant–microorganism interactions. When the underlying mechanisms of plant–microbe interactions are properly investigated, modulation, manipulation, and inoculation strategies can be developed to realize crop growth, increased yield, and pathogen control.

Dr. Wenli Sun Prof. Dr. Yansu Li Dr. Mohamad Hesam Shahrajabian Guest Editors

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Horticulturae is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2000 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

(( https://www.mdpi.com/journal/horticulturae/special_issues/SCQE0M8S50 ))

Dear Colleagues,

The growing need for food production through sustainable cultivation practices, without reducing crop yield and producer income, is a major objective due to increased environmental pollution and the gradual degradation of cultivated soils. Various compounds with bioactive properties can be utilized as biostimulants to boost plant growth and development under normal and stressful conditions. So far, six distinct categories of biostimulants have been recognized, including microbial inoculants; humic substances, such as humic and fulvic acids; protein hydrolysates and amino acids; biopolymers; inorganic compounds; and seaweed extracts, all of which are commercially available with wide applications in agriculture. The most important biostimulant effects on crops are the acceleration of crop establishment, the improvement in nutrient uptake and nutrients use efficiency, the induction of tolerance to biotic and abiotic stressors, the improvement in seed germination, the increase in shelf life of perishable products, the reduction in nutrients leaching, the improvement in root development, the removal of heavy metals from contaminated soils, the improvement in crop performance, the stimulation of the immune system of plants, the improvement in visual quality of final products, and the induction of the biosynthesis of plant defensive biomolecules. Different classification approaches have been suggested so far, based either on the origin of each biostimulant, such as biological or non-biological, microbial and non-microbial, or on the mode of action which divides biostimulants into phytohormonal and non-phytohormonal ones.

This Special Issue focuses on the roles and functions of different types of biostimulants on different agricultural and horticultural crops within the framework of sustainable crop management, aiming to gather critical and important information regarding their positive effects on plant growth and final yield, as well as their impacts on the quality of the final product. Furthermore, the major limitations of these practices as well as the future prospects of biostimulant studies will be presented.

Keywords= biostimulants; chitosan; arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi; amino acids; organic farming; vegetable crops; horticultural crops; microbial biostimulants

(Guest Editor

Biotechnology Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China Interests: organic agriculture; crops; biostimulants; horticulture; forage crops; soil science; sustainable agriculture)

**Prof. Dr. Spyridon A. Petropoulos

Department of Agriculture, Crop Production and Rural Environment, University of Thessaly, 38446 Volos, Greece Interests: organic agriculture; agrobiodiversity; vegetable crops; biostimulants; horticulture; fruit quality; wild edible species; essential oils; medicinal and aromatic plants; stress physiology; bioactve compounds Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals)