Aug 2026· Advances in Materials· pp.
e74575
· 0 citations· 213 references
Medicine
Abstract
Securing global food production while reducing environmental burdens demands materials that combine high nutrient use efficiency with sustainability. Polyphenols, a class of natural plant-derived molecules, provide redox activity, multidentate interactions, and strong interfacial adhesion, making them versatile building blocks for bio-derived agricultural systems. This review summarizes recent advances in the molecular design and multifunctional applications of polyphenol-inspired materials across diverse agriculture sectors, including soil remediation, seed coating, nutrient delivery, crop protection, sensing, nitrification inhibition, and food preservation. It focuses on interfacial assembly, structure-property relationships, and environmental interactions of polyphenol-enabled materials, which collectively govern their performance from laboratory tests to field conditions. Key challenges in current agricultural practice-including low precision and high labor dependence, environmental degradation and ecological imbalance, instability under extreme environmental conditions, and low economic efficiency and unsustainability-are also discussed. Finally, future directions centered on precision and smart agriculture, ecosystem protection, climate-resilient plant interfaces, and circular bioeconomy are outlined. This review presents a comprehensive framework that connects molecular innovation to system-level applications, offering a roadmap for future research and the deployment of polyphenols in agriculture.
The sustainable transformation of modern agriculture requires environmentally friendly materials that can reduce chemical dependence and environmental impacts. As the most abundant natural aromatic polymer, lignin offers unique structural and functional versatility for developing next-generation agricultural inputs. This review summarizes recent advances in the preparation, structural design, and application of lignin-derived materials for green agricultural inputs, including controlled-release fertilizers, pesticides, soil amendments, mulch films, and seed coating agents. The intrinsic properties of lignin, such as antioxidant activity, ultraviolet (UV) shielding, antimicrobial functionality, and tunable degradability, enable the design of multifunctional systems that improve nutrient use efficiency, crop productivity, and soil health while reducing pollution. Progress in chemical modification, polymer blending, and bio-based formulation strategies is discussed in relation to structure–property-performance relationships. Finally, key challenges, including lignin heterogeneity, environmental safety, material cost, and compatibility with agricultural practices, are critically analyzed, and future directions integrating lignin valorization with circular bioeconomy and sustainable agriculture are proposed. This review aims to provide comprehensive insights into lignin’s potential as a versatile platform for agricultural innovation and environmental protection. Lignin offers versatile structures enabling multifunctional agricultural inputs. Advances in lignin modification unlock controlled-release, soil, and film applications. Lignin-based films and coatings enhance crop protection and reduce environmental burden. Structure–property-performance guides lignin material design. Lignin offers versatile structures enabling multifunctional agricultural inputs. Advances in lignin modification unlock controlled-release, soil, and film applications. Lignin-based films and coatings enhance crop protection and reduce environmental burden. Structure–property-performance guides lignin material design.
Xinran Zhang, Yitong Wang, Janar Tursen et al.· Carbon Research· 0 citations
The growing pressure exerted by global food demand, combined with the excessive use of chemical and synthetic inputs, is prompting the agricultural sector to seek innovative and sustainable solutions to improve, or at least maintain, crop yields in a context of increased abiotic stress linked to climate change. Among the promising approaches, biostimulants are attracting growing interest, particularly those derived from natural sources such as seaweed extracts, humic acids, and beneficial microorganisms. These products work through various mechanisms, including osmotic regulation, activation of antioxidant systems, stimulation of root growth, and improvement of nutrient absorption. Many recent research and review articles have explored the optimal combinations of raw materials, formulation processes, target crops, and environmental conditions to maximize beneficial effects on plant growth, soil health, and tolerance to abiotic stresses. As a result, a growing range of commercial products is emerging, with diverse chemical compositions, formulations, and modes of application. However, the precise relationships between the biochemical composition of biostimulants and their physiological effects remain poorly understood, suggesting a key role for molecular synergies. This review provides a concise overview of recent advances in biostimulant research and their potential to enhance food security by improving crop resilience in the context of climate change.
Boujemaa Fassih, Raja Ben-Laouane, Abdessamad Fakhech et al.· Sustainability· 1 citation
Over the past century, agrochemicals have boosted crop productivity and food supply, but concerns over environmental pollution and agricultural sustainability have increased interest in alternative technologies. Redox-active nanozymes are promising tools for regulating ROS-dependent stress responses and pollutant transformation, yet their agricultural use remains limited by insufficient mechanistic understanding. This review examines their major catalytic pathways involved in ROS generation, scavenging, and signaling in agroecosystems. Representative applications are discussed in crop protection, including abiotic-stress mitigation, pathogen control, and insecticide synergism through ROS homeostasis, antioxidant defense, hormone responses, photosynthetic maintenance, ion balance, and metabolic adjustment; and in agroenvironmental management, including detection and removal of pesticides, mycotoxins, antibiotics, heavy metals, and phenolic pollutants. Green synthesis and post-treatment strategies are also summarized. Finally, we discuss challenges in nanozyme design for agricultural scenarios, field stability and efficacy, economic feasibility, intrinsic toxicity, long-term environmental fate, and ecological risk.
Zi-Heng Zhou, Shuai Tang, Hongyu Wu et al.· ACS Applied Materials and In...· 0 citations
Nano-agriculture is a fast-growing interdisciplinary field advancing from lab research to practical field application to tackle global food security and agri-environmental challenges. This concise review summarizes the agronomic functions and underlying molecular mechanisms of typical nanoparticles, including metal oxides (ZnO, TiO2), carbon-based, silica, and elemental (Ag, Se, Cu) nanomaterials, which contribute to crop nutrient regulation, growth improvement, stress tolerance, disease suppression and targeted delivery of bioactive ingredients. The literature synthesis is based on peer-reviewed articles retrieved from Web of Science and Scopus (2015–2026) using keywords combining nanoparticle types with agricultural applications. We further evaluate their potential hazards regarding soil ecosystem deterioration, crop phytotoxicity and food-chain safety. Three key future research directions are outlined: developing stimuli-responsive smart agrochemical nanocarriers, combining nanobiosensing with artificial intelligence for real-time crop monitoring, and optimizing eco-friendly green synthesis of nanomaterials. Overall, this review provides a roadmap enabling nano-agriculture to evolve from discrete single-purpose nanoparticle usage toward integrated precise, intelligent and environmentally sustainable agro-nanosystems.
Wenjun Wu, Yuangang Jiang, Jingyao Deng et al.· Bioscience Nanotechnology· 0 citations
Confronted with severe global challenges, including water scarcity, excessive use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, and heavy metal contamination in soils, conventional agricultural technologies exhibit marked limitations in integrated water–fertilizer management and non-point source pollution control. Leveraging their excellent water retention capacity, intelligent sustained-release properties, and environmental responsiveness, hydrogels offer innovative solutions to advance sustainable agricultural development. This review comprehensively outlines the fundamental types, crosslinking mechanisms, and key functional properties of hydrogels, with a focused discussion on their agricultural deployment as high-efficiency soil conditioners, fertilizer vectors, and pesticide carriers; it deciphers the microscopic water-holding mechanisms under the tristate water model, delineates the divergent water-uptake and retention behaviors between ionic and non-ionic hydrogels, and clarifies the cyclic water-holding and release mechanisms of hydrogels during soil amelioration. Thise paper further synthesizes hydrogel-enabled environmental remediation applications, in which heavy metals and pesticide residues in soils and aquatic systems are removed via functional-group coordination adsorption or photocatalytic degradation; concurrently, hydrogels have been shown to activate plant systemic immunity through calcium-signaling pathways, thereby inducing broad-spectrum antiviral defense responses. Moreover, hydrogels can be integrated into precision agriculture frameworks to enable real-time monitoring of crop physiological status and to support targeted irrigation and fertilization management. This work also evaluates the role of hydrogels in promoting seed germination, root system development, crop metabolic regulation, and stress resilience, while introducing tailored application strategies across distinct plant growth stages. Their documented economic advantages include water conservation, enhanced crop yields, reduced dependence on synthetic fertilizers, and lower labor costs. Nevertheless, the large-scale implementation of hydrogels continues to face multifaceted challenges—particularly poor degradability and latent ecological risks, as conventional polyacrylamide (PAM)-based gels resist soil mineralization and retain potentially neurotoxic monomers, leaving a critical gap in multi-annual field data concerning their non-target interference with native soil aggregate evolution, pore distribution, and rhizospheric carbon–nitrogen footprints. Mechanistically, many hydrogels with tensile strengths below 1 MPa are highly susceptible to three-dimensional network collapse under high-salinity osmotic shock and tillage mechanical stress, exhibiting a precipitous drop in water retention after more than three wet–dry cycles due to deficient long-term structural stability. Compounding these technical gaps are elevated production costs and low farmer adoption, driven by the absence of texture-specific performance thresholds—such as an available water increment ≥ 40% for sandy soils—and the lack of established life-cycle cost models and farmer incentive mechanisms for bio-based hydrogels. Moving forward, hydrogel technology should pivot toward materials innovation and cost-reduction engineering to broaden its applicability, employ ≥3-year, multi-habitat regional trials to delineate ecological benefit–risk boundaries, and ultimately position hydrogels as pivotal enablers of sustainable, green agricultural paradigms.
Microbial nanotechnology provides a simple, reliable, and eco-friendly method for synthesizing various types of nanoparticles (NPs) by utilizing microorganisms, including viruses, fungi, bacteria, and algae, to manufacture and functionalize them. It has extensive applications in various industries, including electronics, healthcare, food production, environmental science, and agriculture. Environmental shifts have greatly influenced global crop production. Abiotic stresses, including heat, UV radiation, salinity, cold, drought, and heavy metals (HMs), adversely affect crop development and yield production. Nanotechnologies are known as powerful tools for crop improvement, aiming to increase crop yield and stress tolerance. Microbially produced NPs can reduce stress-induced impairments and promote plant development in challenging environments. In this context, microbial-mediated NPs act as multifunctional agents that can modulate plant stress responses, improve nutrient availability, and reduce metal toxicity in soil-plant systems. The recent review highlights a comprehensive overview of microbial NPs synthesis, with a particular focus on the mechanisms underlying NPs formation, NPs-HMs interactions, and their role in improving crop resilience. It further highlights recent advances in microbe-mediated nanotechnology for sustainable agriculture and critically discusses current limitations, including scalability, environmental safety, and field-level application challenges. Finally, future perspectives are presented to bridge the gap between laboratory research and practical agricultural implementation.
F. Basit, Hao Wang, Vishwa Deepak et al.· Frontiers in Microbiology· 0 citations