Conducting polymer scaffolds: a new frontier in bioelectronics and bioengineering.

Conducting polymer (CP) scaffolds have emerged as a transformative tool in bioelectronics and bioengineering, advancing the ability to interface with biological systems. Their unique combination of electrical conductivity, tailorability, and biocompatibility surpasses the capabilities of traditional nonconducting scaffolds while granting them access to the realm of bioelectronics. This review examines recent developments in CP scaffolds, focusing on material and device advancements, as well as their interplay with biological systems.

The convergence of traditional and digital biomarkers through AI-assisted biosensing: A new era in translational diagnostics?

Advances in consumer electronics, alongside the fields of microfluidics and nanotechnology have brought to the fore low-cost wearable/portable smart devices. Although numerous smart devices that track digital biomarkers have been successfully translated from bench-to-bedside, only a few follow the same fate when it comes to track traditional biomarkers. Current practices still involve laboratory-based tests, followed by blood collection, conducted in a clinical setting as they require trained personnel and specialized equipment.

Bacterial Membrane Mimetics: From Biosensing to Disease Prevention and Treatment.

Plasma membrane mimetics can potentially play a vital role in drug discovery and immunotherapy owing to the versatility to assemble facilely cellular membranes on surfaces and/or nanoparticles, allowing for direct assessment of drug/membrane interactions. Recently, bacterial membranes (BMs) have found widespread applications in biomedical research as antibiotic resistance is on the rise, and bacteria-associated infections have become one of the major causes of death worldwide. Over the last decade, BM research has greatly benefited from parallel advancements in nanotechnology and bioelectronics, resulting in multifaceted systems for a variety of sensing and drug discovery applications.

Prospects of chloroplast metabolic engineering for developing nutrient-dense food crops.

Addressing nutritional deficiencies in food crops through biofortification is a sustainable approach to tackling malnutrition. Biofortification is continuously being attempted through conventional breeding as well as through various plant biotechnological interventions, ranging from molecular breeding to genetic engineering and genome editing for enriching crops with various health-promoting metabolites. Genetic engineering is used for the rational incorporation of desired nutritional traits in food crops and predominantly operates through nuclear and chloroplast genome engineering.

Chitosan nanoparticles and their combination with methyl jasmonate for the elicitation of phenolics and flavonoids in plant cell suspension cultures.

Productivity enhancement approaches, such as elicitation can overcome the limitations of low metabolite(s) yield in in vitro plant cell culture platforms. Application of biotic/abiotic elicitors triggers molecular responses that lead to a concomitant enhancement in the production of metabolites. Nanoparticles have been tested as alternatives to commonly studied biotic/abiotic elicitors.

Reduced Genotoxicity of Gold Nanoparticles With Protein Corona in .

Increased usage of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) in biomedicine, biosensing, diagnostics and cosmetics has undoubtedly facilitated accidental and unintentional release of AuNPs into specific microenvironments. This is raising serious questions concerning adverse effects of AuNPs on off-target cells, tissues and/or organisms. Applications utilizing AuNPs will typically expose the nanoparticles to biological fluids such as cell serum and/or culture media, resulting in the formation of protein corona (PC) on the AuNPs.

Metabolic Engineering of Rice Cells with Vanillin Synthase Gene (VpVAN) to Produce Vanillin.

Vanillin production by metabolic engineering of proprietary microbial strains has gained impetus due to increasing consumer demand for naturally derived products. Here, we demonstrate the use of rice cell cultures metabolically engineered with vanillin synthase gene (VpVAN) as a plant-based alternative to microbial vanillin production systems. VpVAN catalyzes the signature step to convert ferulic acid into vanillin in Vanilla planifolia.

Designer nanoparticles for plant cell culture systems: Mechanisms of elicitation and harnessing of specialized metabolites.

Plant cell culture systems have become an attractive and sustainable approach to produce high-value and commercially significant metabolites under controlled conditions. Strategies involving elicitor supplementation into plant cell culture media are employed to mimic natural conditions for increasing the metabolite yield. Studies on nanoparticles (NPs) that have investigated elicitation of specialized metabolism have shown the potential of NPs to be a substitute for biotic elicitors such as phytohormones and microbial extracts.

Next-generation metabolic engineering approaches towards development of plant cell suspension cultures as specialized metabolite producing biofactories.

Plant cell suspension culture (PCSC) has emerged as a viable technology to produce plant specialized metabolites (PSM). While Taxol® and ginsenoside are two examples of successfully commercialized PCSC-derived PSM, widespread utilization of the PCSC platform has yet to be realized primarily due to a lack of understanding of the molecular genetics of PSM biosynthesis. Recent advances in computational, molecular and synthetic biology tools provide the opportunity to rapidly characterize and harness the specialized metabolic potential of plants.

A Short History and Perspectives on Plant Genetic Transformation.

Plant genetic transformation is an important technological advancement in modern science, which has not only facilitated gaining fundamental insights into plant biology but also started a new era in crop improvement and commercial farming. However, for many crop plants, efficient transformation and regeneration still remain a challenge even after more than 30 years of technical developments in this field. Recently, FokI endonuclease-based genome editing applications in plants offered an exciting avenue for augmenting crop productivity but it is mainly dependent on efficient genetic transformation and regeneration, which is a major roadblock for implementing genome editing technology in plants.

Vanillin mediated green synthesis and application of gold nanoparticles for reversal of antimicrobial resistance in clinical isolates.

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a serious concern in pathogenic bacteria. As a new approach to addressing AMR, we report here the green synthesis of vanillin capped gold nanoparticles (VAuNPs) using the popular flavouring molecule vanillin (CHO) as a reducing and capping agent. Physicochemical characterization revealed that the synthesised VAuNPs were stable and crystalline in nature.