FIGURE 1.

Morphological characteristics and phenotypic changes in cotton seedling 30 days after inoculation of GN03. (a) Scanning electron microscopic image of the bacterial cell after culture for 16 h at 37°C. (b) The phenotype of the leaf, whole plant and root in cotton seedlings 30 days after inoculation of GN03. (c) The biomass of cotton seedlings. Leaf area is measured as the area of the third leaf from the top bud. Statistical significance was evaluated by one-way ANOVA and LSD post hoc test (*p < 0.05, **p < 0.01; ns, not significant, n = 30). (d) Disease symptoms of cotton plants pre-treated with different concentrations of GN03 (0, 10⁴, and 10⁸ cfu/mL) following inoculation with V. dahliae strain V991 at 18 dpi. (e) Disease indexes of the GN03-pre-treated cotton were determined from 3 to 21 dpi. Values are means ± SD; n = 30.