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Review
. 2022 Jun 6;7(24):20428-20440.
doi: 10.1021/acsomega.2c01405. eCollection 2022 Jun 21.

Layered Double Hydroxides for Sustainable Agriculture and Environment: An Overview

Abhinandan Singha Roy  1   2 , Sreejarani Kesavan Pillai  1 , Suprakas Sinha Ray  1   2
Affiliations
Review

Layered Double Hydroxides for Sustainable Agriculture and Environment: An Overview

Abhinandan Singha Roy et al. ACS Omega. .

Abstract

Agricultural practices in modern society have a detrimental impact on the health of the ecosystem, environment, and consumers. The significantly high usage rate of chemicals causes serious harm, and the sector demands the development of innovative materials that can foster improved food production and lessen ecological impacts. The majority of layered double hydroxides (LDH) are synthetic. At the same time, some of them occur in the form of natural minerals (hydrotalcite), which have recently emerged as favorable materials and provided advanced and ingenious frontiers in various fields of agriculture through practical application possibilities that can replace conventional agricultural systems. LDH can exchange anions intercalated between the layers in the interlayer structure, and there is evidence that atmospheric carbon dioxide and moisture can completely break down LDH over time. Due to certain unique properties such as tunable structure, specific intercalation chemistry, pH-dependent stability, as well as retention of the guest molecules within interlayers and their subsequent controlled release, LDHs are increasingly investigated as materials to enhance yield, quality of crops, and soil in recent times. This review aims to present the current research progress in the design and development of LDH-based materials as nanoscale agrochemicals to illustrate its relevance in making agro-practices more sustainable and efficient. Specific emphasis is given to the functionality of these materials as effective materials for the slow release of fertilizers and plant growth factors as well as adsorption of toxic agrochemical residues and contaminants. Relevant research efforts have been briefly reviewed, and the potential of LDH as new generation green materials to provide solutions to agricultural problems for improving food productivity and security has been summarized.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing financial interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Basic structure of a generic 3R polytype layered double hydroxides. Reproduced from ref (4g). This is an open-access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Effect of (a) pH in phosphor ions adsorption by LDH and (b) time on phosphor ions adsorption from phosphor ions solution. Reproduced with permission from ref (12a). Copyright 2017 Elsevier Science Ltd.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Kinetics of P release into the (a) water: (A) KH2PO4, (B) MAP, and (C) LDH-P and (b) phosphorus uptake by wheat. Reproduced with permission from ref (18g). Copyright 2018 American Chemical Society.
Figure 4
Figure 4
BioClay (dsRNA–LDH) spray protects against viruses in local lesion assays. (a) Local lesions caused by CMV inoculation on cowpea. Plants at the two-leaf stage were sprayed with LDH, CMV2b-dsRNA, and CMV2b-BioClay on day 0 (n = 8–16 leaves per treatment group). Plants were mechanically inoculated with CMV at 1- or 5-days post-treatment. Lesions were counted 10 days pvc. (b) Local lesions caused by PMMoV inoculation on N. tabacum cv. Xanthi. Plants were sprayed with either water, LDH, PMMoVIR54-dsRNA, or PMMoVIR54-BioClay on day 0 (n = 10–25 leaves per treatment group). Plants were mechanically inoculated with PMMoV at either 5 or 20 days post-treatment and necrotic lesions were counted 10 days pvc. (c,d) Images showing the extent of necrotic lesions on N. tabacum cv. Xanthi leaves challenged with PMMoV 5 days postspray treatment (c) and 20 days postspray treatment (d). *P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, and ***P < 0.001 are significant using the Kruskal–Wallis test with posthoc Nemenyi test for multiple comparisons between samples compared with LDH. Data represent mean ± s.e.m. Reproduced with permission from ref (14). Copyright 2017 Springer Nature.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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