Academic Research International Vol. 5(2) March 2014 _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ______ ______ __________________________________________________ ____________________________________________ ____________________________________________ ____________________________________________ Copyright © 2014 SAVAP International ISSN: 2223-9944, eISSN: 2223-9553 www.savap.org.pk 91 www.journals.savap.org.pk The Use of Fungal Endophytes Gliocladium spp. in Different Concentration to Control of Root-Knot Nematode Meloidogyne spp. Nur Amin Department of Plant Protection, Hasanuddin University, INDONESIA. nuramin_62@yahoo.com ABSTRACT Root-knot nematodes Meloidogyne spp are serious pests of many cultivated crops around the world and is estimated economic losses around US $ 157 billion annually. The purpose of the present investigation was to see of efication of endophytic fungi Gliocladium spp.in different concentration towards root-knot nematode Meloidogyne spp. in greenhouse. All of the treatment concentration of endphytic fungi Gliocladium spp. in term of intensity damaged and population density of meloidogyne-J2 statistically different to control. Keywords: Fungal Endophyte,Gliocladium spp., Root-Knot Nematode, Meloidogyne INTRODUCTION Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) is an eudicotiledonous plant that belongs to the family Solanaceae together with other economically important crops such as pepper, eggplant and potato. It is the most important grown fresh market vegetable worldwide with more than 5 million hectares harvested in China, United States of America, India, Turkey and Egypt as the five first producers, respectively. Root-knot nematodes of the genus Meloidogyne are more widely distributed throughout the world than any other major group of plant-parasitic nematodes. The damages to global agricultural crops due to root knot nematodes is estimated around US$ 157 billion annually (Abad et al, 2008). Infected plants show reduced growth, swollen roots which develop into the typical root-knot galls, are two, or three times larger in diameter as healthy root. Root- knot nematodes are very difficult to control because they are polyphagous, where its over 2000 plants species is a highly specialized and complex feeding relationship with their host (Hussey and Janssen, 2002). The life cycle is almost completely confined inside the host plant and high reproductive capacity. Although chemical control is still a common method for reducing nematode population, there is a considerable public pressure to limit or even ban the use of nematicides. Many nematicides are highly toxic and sometimes very mobile in the soil because of their solubility in water. Concern over these chemicals has led to an increased interest in biological control in order to achieve more environmentally friendly methods of reducing nematode damage. By definition, an endophytic funguslives in mycelial form in biological association with the living plant, at least for some time. Therefore the minimal requirement before a fungus is termed an‘endophyte’ should be the demonstrationof its hyphae in living tissue. Sathe andRaghukumar used a bleaching and a staining technique for demonstrating intracellular hyphae in seagrass and this technique may be generally applicable (Sathe and Raghukumar, 1991). In the last few years fungal endophytes have been detected in hundreds of plants including such important agricultural commodities as bananas (Nur Amin, 1994), maize (Nur Amin, 2013a); tree palm oil (Nur Amin et al., 2008) and cocoa plant (Nur Amin et al., 2014). A number of authors have documented that the presence of endophytic fungi provide a