Enhancing secondary metabolites and alleviating environmental stress in crops with mycogenic nanoparticles: A comprehensive review

Nanomaterials have emerged as a promising strategy for enhancing secondary metabolites and improving plants to tolerate abiotic stress. Environmental stressors like extreme temperatures, drought, salinity, and soil nutrient deficiency can severely affect crop yields and quality. In recent years, nanomaterials have shown a promising role in mitigating these stressors' effects and enhancing plant growth and productivity. Nanoparticles have distinct physical and chemical properties that can elicit plant responses to environmental stressors. For instance, nanoparticles can act as carriers for nutrients and plant growth regulators, facilitating their uptake and transport to target tissues. They scavenge reactive oxygen species, reduce oxidative stress, and can serve as potent antioxidants. Nanomaterials stimulate plants to produce specialized metabolites, contain essential compounds protecting the plants from environmental stressors, and offer various human health benefits. Research revealed that nanoparticles stimulate plants for phenolic, flavonoid, and terpenoid production, which are associated with enhanced antioxidant activity and nutritional quality. Though nanoparticles have numerous favorable properties for enhancing crop production and productivity, some chemically derived nanoparticles have many toxic effects, as revealed in recent years, urging to switch to biogenic nanoparticles. This review provides a concise overview of the cost-effective and environment-friendly mycogenic metal nanoparticle synthesis and its applications in enhancing plants' resistance to abiotic stress and secondary metabolites production.

Automated summary

Nanomaterials have emerged as a promising strategy for enhancing secondary metabolites and improving plants' tolerance to abiotic stress. They have shown to mitigate the effects of stressors like extreme temperatures, drought, salinity, and soil nutrient deficiency, while also stimulating plant growth and productivity. Nanoparticles possess distinct properties that elicit plant responses to environmental stressors.