El-salam canal water autochthonous microbiome self- bioremediates the enteric pathogenic bacteria and supports the in-situ lettuce development

El-Salam canal water is planned to cultivate an acreage of 400,000 acre-1 located in north Sinai. In the present study, chemical (pH, EC, DO, BOD, COD, NH4, NO2, NO3, Ca, Mg, Na, K, SAR, Cd, Cu, Fe, Zn) and bacteriological (total bacteria, total and faecal coliforms) analyses were related to the permissible limits of FAO, WHO and Mediterranean countries for irrigation water. Representatives of pathogen and PGPR isolates were secured from the canal water and rhizospheres of some plants cultivated in El-Qantara Shark fields irrigated with such water. Based on biochemical properties and 16S rRNA gene sequencing, the pathogens were identified as Escherichia fergusonii, Klebsiella pneumoniae and Shigella sonnei while PGPR were belonging to Bacillus altitudinis, Brevibacillus brevis, Paenibacillus xylanexedens and Stenotrophomonas maltophilia. These strains did possess the ability to produce the plant growth accelerating compounds, abscisic acid (15.0 – 45.0 μg/ 100ml), cytokinins (1.2 – 90.2 μg/100ml), gibberellins (2.7 – 4.0 mg/100ml), indole acetic acid (73.0 – 203.0 μg/100ml), and polysaccharides (1.1 – 5.6 mg/ml). They successfully antagonized the pathogen E. fergusonii in nutrient agar culture media. The lettuce growth traits were found to be PGPR inoculation-dependent rather than irrigation water type-dependent.