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The effects of polyvinyl chloride microplastics and zinc oxide nanoparticles co-exposure on nutritional quality of purple waxy maize grains
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Researchers investigated the co-exposure effects of polyvinyl chloride microplastics and zinc oxide nanoparticles on purple waxy maize grain quality. Surprisingly, the combination treatment increased ear weight and improved nutritional quality by promoting protein, starch, and amino acid accumulation, suggesting that zinc oxide nanoparticles may help mitigate some negative effects of microplastic soil contamination on crop nutrition.
The adverse effects of emerging pollutant microplastics on plants have been fully explored, but there is limited information on how to alleviate these impacts. Here, we investigated the effects of co-exposure with polyvinyl chloride microplastics and zinc oxide nanoparticles (PVC + nZnO) in soil on yield and nutritional quality of purple waxy corn grains at 10, 20, and 30 days after pollination. Results showed that PVC + nZnO increased fresh ear weight and improved grain nutritional quality, particularly by promoting the accumulation of protein, starch, sucrose, alanine, glutamate, and aspartate. A flavonoids-targeted metabolomics detected 185 flavonoid metabolites, with a significant increase in total flavonoids content under PVC + nZnO. Key flavonoid constituents identified included astragalin, nicotiflorin, quercimeritrin, dihydrokaempferol, eriodictyol, isorhamnetin, kaempferol, and naringenin chalcone. Dynamic transcriptomicis revealed that these nutrients accumulation was regulated at transcriptional level. Additionally, WGCNA identified 54 hub genes, which could be utilized as potential targets for improving nutritional quality of waxy corn.
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