Unveiling the Potential of Biostimulants in Agriculture to Enhance Plant Stress Responses and Productivity

The field of agricultural science is actively exploring biostimulants for their potential to mitigate crop losses due to climatic and environmental challenges. As climate change intensifies, crops face increasing biotic and abiotic stresses, leading to significant declines in global agricultural yield. Traditional methods often fall short of offering holistic solutions that cater to both crop protection and ecosystem conservation. Biostimulants emerge as a promising alternative, comprising compounds and microorganisms that enhance plant performance and resilience when applied to seeds, plants, or even the soil. Despite their recognized ability to bolster stress tolerance through physiological, biochemical, and molecular mechanisms, their effects remain insufficiently explored, especially at the molecular level.

This Research Topic aims to advance the knowledge of physiological and molecular mechanisms by which biostimulants enhance plant protection against biotic and abiotic stresses, as well as their ability to improve the efficiency of plant metabolism, thereby promoting growth and yield. Our primary objectives are to deepen the understanding of their mechanistic action, aiding in the identification and optimization of biostimulants for varied environmental conditions. By addressing both biotic and abiotic stress responses, as well as investigating their interaction with the plant microbiome, we aim to discover new avenues for research and practical applications.

To gather further insights into biostimulant efficacy and application, we welcome articles addressing, but not limited to, the following themes:
• Physiological mechanisms influencing plant responses to biostimulants
• Omics approaches, including transcriptomics and proteomics, to understand biostimulant effects on gene expression and metabolic pathways
• Modulation of plant responses under combined stress conditions through biostimulants
• Phenomics in assessing the potential of biostimulants by monitoring physiological parameters
• Biostimulants' impact on rhizosphere microbiome interactions and plant-microbe relations
• Practical considerations: evaluating the economic and regulatory landscapes for biostimulant implementation

We invite submissions of original research, review articles, mini-reviews, and methods articles in these areas.

Article types and fees

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• FAIR² DATA Direct Submission
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• Mini Review
• Opinion
• Original Research
• ... View all formats

Articles that are accepted for publication by our external editors following rigorous peer review incur a publishing fee charged to Authors, institutions, or funders.

Article types

This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:

• Brief Research Report
• Editorial
• FAIR² Data
• FAIR² DATA Direct Submission
• Hypothesis and Theory
• Methods
• Mini Review
• Opinion
• Original Research
• Perspective
• Policy and Practice Reviews
• Review
• Systematic Review
• Technology and Code

Keywords: Characterization of Microbiome Communities, Biostimulants Identification and Characterization, Abiotic and Biotic stresses, Climate change and crop resilience, Metabolomics and Proteomics in Agriculture, Plant Physiological Mechanisms, Soil-plant-microbe Interactions

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.