A handbook guide to better use of nanoparticles in plants

ABSTRACT

During the last decade, several nanoparticles have been synthesized such as nano-silver, nano-silica, nano-aluminum, nano-zinc oxide, nano-copper, carbon nanotubes, and nano-titanium dioxide. The use of these nanoparticles is rapidly increasing in various areas such as textiles, pharmaceutics, cosmetics, and environmental remediation. In sustainable agriculture and crops improvement, these NPs are being used mainly as nanopesticides, nanofertilizers, and nanosensors, and their application raised a big question about their risk of toxicity to the plants and the environment. Many authors described the use of NPs, their types and the conditions of their use; they further reported their positive and negative effects on growth, germination, and photosynthesis on plants. However, because of the plethora of information available; one gets confused on choosing the most adequate conditions and the most adequate NPs to use to improve crops productivity and avoid toxicity. We thus aimed in this review to report the major current applications of NPs that only had a positive impact on plants growth and productivity. We further review concisely the optimum method of delivery of NPs, their properties, and their concentration limit. Hence, we want this review to serve as a handbook guide for nano-users in plants field.

KEYWORDS:

• Nanoparticles
• method of delivery
• concentration limit
• plant
• agriculture

Acknowledgments

The authors extend their appreciation to the Deanship of Scientific Research at King Khalid University for funding this work through the Small Research group project under grant number (R.G.P.1/195/41) and the Tunisian Ministry of Higher Education, Scientific Research and Technology (LR19CBBC02). Dr. Besma Sghaier-Hammami was supported by a project “Programme d’Encouragement des Jeunes Chercheurs (19PEJC07- 17).

Disclosure statement

All authors declare no conflict of interest.

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No human and/or animal participants were involved in this research.

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Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

All authors are funded through the Small Research group project from the Deanship of Scientific Research at King Khalid University under research grant number (R.G.P.1/195/41).