Amino acid transporters mediate autonomous delivery of nanoparticle vehicles into living plants.
Xia, X
Dong, J
Li, A
Wang, Y
Liu, Y
Zhu, Y
Xu, L
Jing, Z
Wang, J
Zou, Y
Sun, S
Wang, L
Lu, Y
Soeriyadi, A
Wang, X
Patrick, JW
Offler, CE
Zheng, M
Song, C-P
Shi, B
- Publisher:
- NATURE PORTFOLIO
- Publication Type:
- Journal Article
- Citation:
- Nat Commun, 2025, 16, (1), pp. 6715
- Issue Date:
- 2025-07-21
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Presence of the cell wall and the lack of streamlined pathways for cellular delivery of external agents into plants is a core challenge of plant biotechnology and crop engineering development. However, both viral and bacterial transmission have their own restrictions and the few non-heavy metal nanodelivery platforms require external forces for tissue penetration. Such dependency limits any high-throughput application considering the large plant numbers to be treated in the field or even laboratory exercises. Herein, we demonstrate Aspartic acid (Asp) decorated poly(ethylene glycol)-block-poly(2-(diisopropylamino)ethyl methacrylate) (Asp-PEG-PDPA) copolymers assembled micelles (Asp/PDPA-NP), a platform that utilises amino acid transporters (AtAAP1 and AtLHT1) as receptors for clathrin-dependent endocytosis, freely translocate to release loaded cargo into various plant tissue/cell types in a species-independent manner within ≤10 minutes through simple spray or co-culture. As proof-of-concept, abscisic acid (ABA)-loaded Asp/PDPA-NP was tested for its efficacy to confer plant drought resistance. Asp/PDPA-NP@ABA reduced the effective ABA dose down to 1 nM (one million-fold) and elicited anti-drought potency in representative eudicot (soybean) and monocot (maize) crop species. Owing to its delivery efficiency, Asp/PDPA-NP holds promise as a potent carrier for diverse chemicals and biomolecules in plant systems.
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