Best Practices and Pitfalls in Developing Nanomaterial Delivery Tools for Plants

Abstract

Numerous reports of nanomaterial-assisted delivery of DNA, RNA, and protein to plants for biotechnology applications emerged over the past decade. While the field has experienced rapid growth, best practices for developing and validating nanomaterial delivery tools for plants have not yet been established. Best practices are well-established for clinical/animal cell delivery experiments, yet plants pose a distinct challenge requiring separate considerations due to their unique tissue structures and cellular morphology. In this Perspective, we provide recommendations and highlight pitfalls in developing nanomaterial tools for delivery of “Central Dogma” cargos to plants. Given the ongoing interest in the field, this discussion will aid in improving the rigor of this nascent field toward practical applications of nanomaterial delivery tools.