The fungus P. acaciicola was isolated from the healthy roots of a mangrove tree, B. gymnorrhiza, collected in November 2012 at The Mangrove Forest Learning and Development Center 2, Samut Sakhon province, Thailand. The fungus P. acaciicola was cultured on Potato Dextrose Agar (PDA) (HiMedia Laboratories, Mumbai, India) containing 10% of seawater (collected from Bang Saen Beach, Chonburi Province) for 1 week. The agar was then inoculated into 500 mL of Potato Dextrose Broth (PDB) (HiMedia Laboratories, Mumbai, India) containing 10% of seawater. After incubation for 21 days, broth (total volume of 500 mL) and fungal mycelia were separated by filtration using filter paper (Whatman, Grade 1). The second batch of fungal culture was a scaled-up cultivation of the fungus P. acaciicola. The fungus was cultured on PDA prepared in a mixture of seawater and distilled H₂O (10% seawater). After incubation for 1 week at 30 &#8451, the agar was then inoculated into 1000 mL Erlenmeyer flasks (forty flasks), each containing 250 mL of PDB prepared in 10% seawater. After incubation for 21 days, fungal culture was filtered to separate mycelia and broth (total volume of 10 L).

The fungus P. multirostrata EA-12 was isolated from fresh leaves of E. Adenophorum collected in Kunming Institute of Botany, Kunming, Yunnan province, PR China in July 2012. This fungal strain was cultured on potato dextrose agar medium at 25 ℃ for 10 days. The agar plugs were inoculated in 500-ml Erlenmeyer flasks, each containing 100 ml of potato dextrose media. Flask cultures were incubated at 28 ℃ on a rotary shaker at 160r.p.m. for 2 days as seed culture. Sixty 500-ml Erlenmeyer flasks each containing 150 ml of potato dextrose broth were individually inoculated with 25′l of seed culture and incubated at 25 ℃ on a rotary shaker at 160r.p.m. for 15 days.