Microbial-plant interaction enhances garlic’s yield and antimicrobial activity

The objective of our study is to evaluate three endemic microorganisms on enhancing yield of garlic and antimicrobial activity of its extract, in addition to identify the optimal conditions to preserve extract bioactivity during storage. Garlic cloves were cultivated under green house and inoculated with each microorganism. The effects of these inoculants were assessed by measuring various parameters including plant height, bulb weight, leaf pigment content as well as the frequency of colonization by arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi. Moreover, garlic samples from each treatment’s water-based extracts with different concentration were evaluated against Salmonella typhi and four other human pathogenic strains. Furthermore, to evaluate the stability of the antimicrobial activity of the extract of garlic, the extracts separated into three different formulation types and evaluated against the same pathogenic strains. The interaction between compounds derived from garlic and the outer membrane protein of S. typhi was investigated using molecular docking analysis. The results showed that the endemic microorganisms in particularly PGPR enhanced the yield of garlic. Furthermore, the aqueous extract of garlic inoculated with T3 was observed to be the most effective against the pathogens under study. This activity was found to increase with increasing concentrations of the extract. Additionally, it has been demonstrated that both lyophilized and fresh garlic extracts are effective treatments for bacterial infections; however, the aged aqueous extract did not show any beneficial effects. Furthermore, γ-glutamyl-S-allylcysteine allicin and allin showed the highest binding affinity against Salmonella typhi among the garlic phytochemicals that were studied. These findings suggest that endemic microorganisms may raise the amount of organosulfur compounds in garlic and that the freeze-drying process is a useful technique for preserving those chemical compounds. This method provides a more environmentally friendly way to create plant-based antimicrobial formulations.