Publication

Abstract : Nanotechnology has revolutionized with lots of applications in the medicinal field to prevent, detect and treat several biological problems including disease and infections. The plant virus nanoparticles (VNPs) and virus-like nanoparticles (VLPs) obtained through viral nanotechnology have become a versatile platform in several fields such as in obtaining high selectivity and specificity, optics and biosensing, drug delivery and targeting, nanocatalysis, next-generation nanoelectronics. The capsid proteins in plant viruses aid in the production of novel nanomaterials, also they can self-assemble and form well-organized icosahedral viruses with altered coat protein subunits, interior and exterior size properties. The virus interior is particularly used to protect the sensitive compounds and encapsulate them, while their exterior can be utilized to coat small molecules in a précised manner. These properties of viruses including their biocompatibility nature have led to the development of VNPs/VLPs to achieve targeted drug delivery. Plant viruses are natural immunogenic and thus they are altered to use as vaccines against various pathogens. In this chapter, we discuss their applications and role in nanoparticle synthesis to create an effective and alternate way related to both medicine and nanotechnology disciplines.