The successful application of nanotechnology in sectors such as electronics, medicine, national security and other fields, can also be transferred to agricultural applications and facilitate their development. However, there is still resistance for reasons such as sustainability, pollution and food safety. For this reason, scientific research also needs to focus its efforts to study how nanotechnology would impact the growth of crops. In the nanotechnology world, gold nanoparticles has been widely used in high-tech electronics, catalysis, and biomedicine for diagnosis and treatment. In this work, toxicological effects of gold nanoparticles in the germination and growth of plants was studied using Abelmoschus esculentus. The gold nanoparticles were synthesized using sodium citrate. The formation of nanoparticles was monitored using UV-Visible spectroscopy showing the characteristic absorption peak at 521 nm, whit a narrow size distribution and an average size of 85nm, based on Dynamic Light Scattering (DLS) measurements. The toxicological results shown none inhibitory effect in the germination of seeds, rather presented an enhancement in the root size as well as the augmentation of the amount of root hairs. This finding put forward a worthwhile advantage to employ the gold nanoparticles as a new kind of co-fertilizer, because is helping to the plant to have an enhanced absorption of nutrients, assuring the success of the crop. Modifications to the synthesis method will be made to minimize the size of the nanoparticles and evaluate the size effects in the toxicological study.

Employ of nanotechnology as a resource of improvement for the agricultural sector: Enhancement on the early growth of Abelmoschus esculentus treated seeds using green synthesized gold nanoparticles

253rd National Meeting (2017)

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