Novel nanoscaled materials from lignocellulosic sources: Potential applications in the agricultural sector

The agricultural sector is facing pivotal global challenges such as climate change, urbanization, sustainable use of resources, and environmental issues. These situations are further exacerbated by the growing food demand that will be needed to sustain an estimated population growth from the current level of about 6 billion to 9 billion by 2050. Plant-based agricultural production is the base of the broad agriculture systems providing food, feed, fiber, and fuels. While the demand for crop yield will rapidly increase in the future, the agriculture and natural resources are limited. In this scenario, traditional strategies for plant protection often result insufficient, and the application of chemical-based pesticides has negative effects on the environment, animals, and humans. Nanotechnology has the potential to conceive products based on environmentally friendly natural polymers which, in addition of being biodegradable, can also be obtained from natural sources and/or biowastes. Specifically, lignocellulosic materials are the most promising feedstock as natural and renewable resources essential to the functioning of modern industrial societies, and the huge amounts of lignocellulosic biomass can potentially be converted into high-value products for different final applications. Current research trends and recent advances about the extraction methodologies and properties of nanostructured materials and systems from lignocellulosic biomass and their potential applications in sustainable plant protection for agriculture management will be presented in this chapter, while potential future applications will be analyzed and discussed.