Mycopath (2013) 11(1): 9-13 Research ArticleResearch Article Antifungal activity of Melia azedarach L. fruit extract against Sclerotium rolfsii, the cause of collar rot disease of chickpea Iqra Haider Khan and *Arshad Javaid Institute of Agricultural Sciences, University of the Punjab, Lahore, Pakistan. * Corresponding author’s email: arshad.iags@pu.edu.pk , arshadjpk@yahoo.com Abstract Laboratory bioassays were carried out to evaluate the antifungal potential of methanolic fruit extract of Melia azedarach L. and its various fractions against Sclerotium rolfsii, the cause of collar rot of chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.). Different concentrations of methanolic fruit extract (0.5, 1.0, …, 3.5%) were prepared and their effect against the fungal pathogen was tested using malt extract broth in 100-mL conical flasks. All the tested concentrations of the methanolic extract significantly reduced fungal biomass by 81–84%. Methanolic extract was partitioned using n-hexane, ethyl acetate and n-butanol. The effect of different isolated fractions was tested against the pathogen in 10-mL volume test tubes. A concentration of 3.125 mg mL -1 of different fractions significantly decreased fungal biomass by 41–65%. The present study concludes that methanolic fruit extract of M. azedarach and its various fractions possess antifungal activity and can be used for management of S. rolfsii. Keywords: Chickpea, collar rot disease, fruit extract, Melia azedarach, Sclerotium rolfsii. Introduction Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.), a cool season crop of family Fabaceae, is grown worldwide as a major source of food (Doyle and Luckow, 2003). It is an important legume of tropics and dry land areas all over the world (Agarwal et al., 2012). Seed is the main consumable part of the plant (Hossain et al., 2010). More than 50 countries are producing chickpea. South-Eastern Asia is producing 79% chickpea globally. Pakistan, Australia, Iran, USA, Canada, Turkey, Mexico, Ethiopia and Myanmar are the other most important chickpea producing countries. Worldwide total area under chickpea cultivation was 12.0 million ha, with 10.9 million MT productions and the average yield was 913 kg ha −1 . Widely growth of chickpea is in South Asia and the Mediterranean area of the world (Sheehy and Sharma, 2012). In spite of active breeding programs, the average yield of chickpea did not increase considerably over the years. During the previous era (1993–2011), worldwide annual production rate of chickpea has been low (0.007%) and average yield was nearly constant (Charrondiere et al., 2011). Sclerotium rolfsii is a soil-borne fungal pathogen that causes diseases in a wide range of horticultural and agricultural crop plants. It has over 500 species hosts in 100 plant families (Hegde et al., 2010). Diseases caused by S. rolfsii are often assigned as southern blight. The fungus forms sclerotia that can remain in the soil for several years and function as overwintering structures as well as primary inoculum for the disease. Collar rot disease caused by Sclerotium rolfsii Sacc., is among the main biotic factors responsible for low chickpea production under conducive conditions (Hussain et al., 2006; Maurya et al., 2008). This disease can cause about 55-95% chickpea seedlings mortality (Gurha and Dubey, 1982). Good soil moisture, low organic matter and high soil temperature of 25-30 °C favour the disease (Mathur and Sinha, 1968). Use of chemical fungicides is an effective mean to control S. rolfsii (Conway et al., 1996; Khattabi et al., 2001). However, use of these chemical pesticides has a number of disadvantages because of their adverse effect on biotic and abiotic environment. These chemicals have broad spectrum activity and thus may destroy non-target organisms too (Haas et al., 2000). Due to ill effects of synthetic agro-chemicals, scientists are now in search of alternatives from natural environment for management of plant diseases. Among these alternatives, use of crude and purified plant products for controlling plant pathogens are gaining much importance (Jabeen et al., 2011; Kanwal et al., 2011; Javaid et al., 2012). The present study was conducted to investigate the antifungal activity of methanolic fruit extract of Melia azedarach for the management of S. rolfsii.