Biology subjects

Poonam, A. D.

Publications and source records attributed to Poonam, A. D..

3 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2025

Microneedle-based precision payload delivery in plants

Traditional crop delivery methods, such as foliar spray and soil application, face significant limitations, including nutrient loss, environmental impacts, and low delivery efficiency. Recent advances in nanomaterials have offered novel molecular delivery platforms, but challenges such as synthesis complexity, long-term stability, and compliance with rigorous biosafety regulations persist. To provide a simpler, lower-cost, and safer alternative, we developed a polyvinyl alcohol (PVA)-based microneedle (MN) delivery system that can be precisely applied to various plant tissues (e.g., stem, lateral branch, or petiole), which demonstrates high delivery efficiency compared to the conventional methods (3.5x higher tissue accumulation) while reducing application dose (>90% less). This MN system facilitates the delivery of diverse small molecules, ranging from fluorescent dyes, growth promoters, to antiviral hormones, into plant tissues, on the other hand showing limited wounding stress to the plant. By applying fluorescent dye-loaded MNs onto tomato stems, we demonstrated effective molecular diffusion through vascular tissues. Additionally, MNs loaded with gibberellic acid (GA3) enhanced stem and branch growth in tomatoes and restored the lateral flowering phenotype in Arabidopsis ft-10 mutants, with significant upregulation of GA receptor gene expression. Lastly, salicylic acid (SA) injections with MNs induced resistance to tomato spotted wilt virus (TSWV) in Nicotiana benthamiana, comparable to conventional spray and infiltration-based approaches. This easily fabricated and cost-effective MN system offers a promising tool for precision agriculture, enhancing plant health and productivity while significantly reducing the use of agrochemicals.

plant biology↗

bioRxiv2024

A Dual-Functional Needle-Based VOC Sensing Platform for Rapid Vegetable Quality Examination

Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are common constituents of fruits, vegetables, and crops, and are closely associated with their quality attributes, such as firmness, sugar level, ripeness, translucency, and pungency levels. While VOCs are vital for assessing vegetable quality, traditional detection methods, such as Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (GC-MS) and Proton Transfer Reaction Mass Spectrometry (PTR-MS) are limited by expensive equipment, complex sample preparation, and slow turnaround time. Additionally, the transient nature of VOCs complicates their detection using these methods. Here, we developed a paper-based colorimetric sensor array combined with needles that could induce vegetable VOC release in a minimally invasive fashion and analyze VOCs in situ with a smartphone reader device. The colorimetric sensor array was optimized using sulfur compounds as main targets and classified fourteen different vegetable VOCs, including sulfoxides, sulfides, mercaptans, thiophenes, and aldehydes. By combining principal components analysis (PCA) analysis, the integrated sensor platform proficiently discriminated between four vegetable subtypes originating from two major categories within 2 min of testing time. This rapid and minimally invasive sensing technology holds great promise for conducting field-based vegetable quality monitoring. Graphical abstract O_FIG O_LINKSMALLFIG WIDTH=200 HEIGHT=133 SRC="FIGDIR/small/628229v1_ufig1.gif" ALT="Figure 1"> View larger version (44K): org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@12bf541org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@f2a809org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@f5f5b7org.highwire.dtl.DTLVardef@1d7027f_HPS_FORMAT_FIGEXP M_FIG C_FIG

plant biology↗

bioRxiv2024

Nondestructive Seed Genotyping via Microneedle-Based DNA Extraction

Crop breeding plays an essential role in addressing food security by enhancing crop yield, disease resistance, and nutritional value. However, the current crop breeding process faces multiple challenges and limitations, especially in genotypic evaluations. Traditional methods for seed genotyping remain labor-intensive, time-consuming, and cost-prohibitive outside of large-scale breeding programs. Here, we present a handheld microneedle (MN)-based seed DNA extraction platform for rapid, nondestructive, and in-field DNA isolation from crop seeds for instant marker analysis. Using soybean seeds as a case study, we demonstrated the use of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) MN patches for the successful extraction of DNA from softened soybean seeds. This extraction technology maintained high seed viability, showing germination rates of 82% and 79%, respectively, before and after MN sampling. The quality of MN-extracted DNA was sufficient for various genomic analyses, including PCR, LAMP, and whole genome sequencing. Importantly, this MN patch method also allowed for the identification of specific genetic differences between soybean varieties. Additionally, we designed a 3D-printed extraction device, which enabled multiplexed seed DNA extraction in a microplate format. In the future, this method could be applied at scale and in-field for crop seed DNA extraction and genotyping analysis.

plant biology↗