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  • Perspective
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Species-independent analytical tools for next-generation agriculture

Nature Plants volume 6, pages 1408–1417 (2020)Cite this article

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Abstract

Innovative approaches are urgently required to alleviate the growing pressure on agriculture to meet the rising demand for food. A key challenge for plant biology is to bridge the notable knowledge gap between our detailed understanding of model plants grown under laboratory conditions and the agriculturally important crops cultivated in fields or production facilities. This Perspective highlights the recent development of new analytical tools that are rapid and non-destructive and provide tissue-, cell- or organelle-specific information on living plants in real time, with the potential to extend across multiple species in field applications. We evaluate the utility of engineered plant nanosensors and portable Raman spectroscopy to detect biotic and abiotic stresses, monitor plant hormonal signalling as well as characterize the soil, phytobiome and crop health in a non- or minimally invasive manner. We propose leveraging these tools to bridge the aforementioned fundamental gap with new synthesis and integration of expertise from plant biology, engineering and data science. Lastly, we assess the economic potential and discuss implementation strategies that will ensure the acceptance and successful integration of these modern tools in future farming practices in traditional as well as urban agriculture.

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Fig. 1: First-generation examples of optical nanosensors and Raman technology for non-destructive monitoring of plant stresses.
Fig. 2: Application of species-independent diagnostic tools in next-generation agriculture.

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Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful for the funding and support from the MIT-Singapore SMART programme, specifically the Disruptive and Sustainable Technology for Agricultural Precision (DiSTAP) integrated research group, and the National Research Foundation, Singapore (NRF-CRP16-2015-04 to N.I.N). T.T.S.L. was supported on a graduate fellowship by the Agency of Science, Research and Technology, Singapore. We thank B. Skrip (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) for creating Fig. 2 in this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Tedrick Thomas Salim Lew, Min Hao Wong & Michael S. Strano

  2. Temasek Life Sciences Laboratory, 1 Research Link, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore

    Rajani Sarojam, In-Cheol Jang, Bong Soo Park, Naweed I. Naqvi & Nam-Hai Chua

  3. Disruptive & Sustainable Technologies for Agricultural Precision, Singapore-MIT Alliance for Research and Technology, Singapore, Singapore

    Rajani Sarojam, In-Cheol Jang, Bong Soo Park, Gajendra P. Singh, Rajeev J. Ram, Nam-Hai Chua & Michael S. Strano

  4. Research Laboratory of Electronics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Rajeev J. Ram

  5. The Faculty of Agriculture, Food and Environment, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Rehovot, Israel

    Oded Shoseyov

  6. Metabolomics Research Group, RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science, Yokohama, Japan

    Kazuki Saito

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  1. Tedrick Thomas Salim Lew
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Contributions

T.T.S.L., N.-H.C. and M.S.S. led the writing of this manuscript. T.T.S.L., R.S., I.-C.J., B.S.P., N.I.N., M.H.W., G.P.S., R.J.R., O.S., K.S., N.-H.C. and M.S.S. contributed to the writing of specific sections, critical reading of the manuscript and the reviewing of appropriate references.

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Correspondence to Nam-Hai Chua or Michael S. Strano.

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Lew, T.T.S., Sarojam, R., Jang, IC. et al. Species-independent analytical tools for next-generation agriculture. Nat. Plants 6, 1408–1417 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41477-020-00808-7

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