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Synergistic Impacts of Microplastic Pollution and Climate Extremes on Crop Productivity: Multi-Omics Insights and CRISPR/Cas9-Mediated Mitigation Strategies
Summary
This review paper pulls together 142 studies to show how microplastic pollution in soil, combined with drought and heat, damages crops at a molecular level—stressing plants in ways that can hurt water absorption and trigger harmful cell damage. This matters because as microplastics and climate extremes both worsen, our food supply faces a growing double threat; the researchers also outline potential fixes, like gene editing and soil-restoring technologies, to help crops become more resilient.
Convergent environmental pressures, including accelerating climate extremes and pervasive microplastic contamination of agricultural soils, pose compounding threats to global crop productivity that remain poorly characterized at the mechanistic level. In this PRISMA-compliant systematic review of 142 peer-reviewed studies (2015–2026), we integrate multi-omics evidence (transcriptomics, proteomics, and metabolomics) to elucidate molecular reprogramming underlying the combined effects of drought, heat, and microplastic stress in major crops. Polyethylene microplastics reduce soil water-holding capacity and increase ammonia volatilization by up to 33.9%, while nanoplastic uptake induces reactive oxygen species accumulation and lipid peroxidation. Key transcription factor families, including DREB, NAC, and MYB, emerge as central regulatory hubs under dual stress. We propose a tripartite mitigation framework that (i) leverages CRISPR/Cas9-mediated editing of stress-responsive loci (OST2, SAPK2, ARGOS8, BnaA9.NF-YA7) for intrinsic resilience; (ii) implements IoT-enabled precision irrigation and hyperspectral monitoring for real-time stress management; and (iii) employs biochar-assisted physical sorption and synthetic microbial communities to restore soil health. This integrative synthesis provides actionable guidance for experimental validation, identifies priority CRISPR targets, and highlights knowledge gaps in long-term microplastic degradation and stress interaction, offering a mechanistic and translational roadmap for developing climate- and microplastic-resilient crops.