**12. Disease resistance and ECM fungi**

Much research has confirmed that ECMF increase disease resistance in plants against soil-borne plant pathogens. But the efficiency of biocontrol achieved by ECMF is reliant on the species complex, substrate, and host plants. Also, the defense given by ECMF is not effective against all the pathogens controlled by soil and other environmental conditions [20]. This symbiotic relationship protects plants from plant pathogens by using different mechanisms such as changing root development and morphological character creating variations in the tissues of host root and also manufacturing biochemical and physiological variations within the host, varying host nutrition, adapting mycorrhizal sphere that affects microbial populations, challenging for colonization spots and foods, and triggering defense mechanisms and parasitism on nematodes [17].
