Application of Nanotechnology in Plant Genetic Engineering

Abstract

The ever-increasing food requirement with globally growing population demands advanced agricultural practices to improve grain yield, to gain crop resilience under unpredictable extreme weather, and to reduce production loss caused by insects and pathogens. To fulfill such requests, genome engineering technology has been applied to various plant species. To date, several generations of genome engineering methods have been developed. Among these methods, the new mainstream technology is clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR) with nucleases. One of the most important processes in genome engineering is to deliver gene cassettes into plant cells. Conventionally used systems have several shortcomings, such as being labor- and time-consuming procedures, potential tissue damage, and low transformation efficiency. Taking advantage of nanotechnology, the nanoparticle-mediated gene delivery method presents technical superiority over conventional approaches due to its high efficiency and adaptability in different plant species. In this review, we summarize the evolution of plant biomolecular delivery methods and discussed their characteristics as well as limitations. We focused on the cutting-edge nanotechnology-based delivery system, and reviewed different types of nanoparticles, preparation of nanomaterials, mechanism of nanoparticle transport, and advanced application in plant genome engineering. On the basis of established methods, we concluded that the combination of genome editing, nanoparticle-mediated gene transformation and de novo regeneration technologies can accelerate crop improvement efficiently in the future.

Recent Advances in Tomato Gene Editing

“…The RNP complexes target and cleave the target sites in the DNA immediately after delivery and are rapidly degraded in those cells. Several recent systematic reviews have described the different methods used to deliver the CRISPR/Cas system to plants [ 72 , 73 , 74 , 75 ], and we will not provide an exhaustive description of them here. Below, you will find a brief overview of these methods, with an emphasis on recent developments for CRISPR/Cas delivery in tomatoes.…”

Advances in and Perspectives on Transgenic Technology and CRISPR-Cas9 Gene Editing in Broccoli

“…Additionally, enhancing the efficiency of Agrobacterium - and PEG-mediated transient transformation in broccoli is crucial. Experiments with new bacterial strains that exhibit high infection efficiency and the use of specific nanomaterials for transformation are potential avenues to explore in broccoli genetic engineering [ 168 , 169 ]. Furthermore, significant advancements in ternary vector systems for Agrobacterium -mediated transformation have been made, which are vital for gene function analysis and the creation of novel germplasms [ 170 , 171 , 172 ].…”