Nanoparticles successfully deliver genetic material to plants via roots

University of Queensland researchers have for the first time introduced genetic material into plants via their roots, opening a potential pathway for rapid crop improvement. The research is published in Nature Plants.

Professor Bernard Carroll from UQ's School of Chemistry and Molecular Biosciences said nanoparticle technology could help fine-tune plant genes to increase crop yield and improve food quality.

"Traditional plant breeding and genetic modification take many generations to produce a new crop variety, which is time-consuming and expensive," Professor Carroll said.

"We have succeeded in having plant roots absorb a benign nanoparticle which was developed by Professor Gordon Xu's group at UQ for the delivery of vaccines and cancer treatments in animals.“

"Plant cell walls are rigid and wood-like, much tougher than human or animal cells, so we coated the nanoparticle with a protein that gently loosens the plant cell wall. "The protein coating helped the nanoparticle break through the cell walls to deliver a synthetic mRNA cargo into plants for the first time."

Image source: Yong et al. (2025), Nature Plants.