A simple graphene oxide-based DNA purification strategy for plant pathogen detection.

BACKGROUND: The on-site molecular detection of plant pathogens is particularly important for the development of sustainable agriculture. Extracting DNA from plant tissues, microbes, or coexisting environments is complex, labor-intensive, and time-consuming. To facilitate this process, we propose a DNA purification strategy based on graphene oxide (GO).

RESULTS: The excellent adsorption ability of GO was verified by visualizing changes in its microscopic surface and macroscopic mixture. To further optimize the DNA purification, we determined the optimal GO concentration and treatment time at 95 °C (2 mg/mL and 2 min, respectively). We confirmed that our strategy is effective on plant tissues and various microorganisms, and that the obtained DNA can be directly used for polymerase chain reaction amplification. Combining the proposed GO-based DNA purification method with the loop-mediated isothermal amplification method is superior to the cetyltrimethylammonium bromide method and a commercial kit for detecting plant pathogens in terms of the required steps, time, cost, and detection effect.

CONCLUSION: We present a feasible, rapid, simple, and low-cost DNA purification method with high practical value for scientific applications in plant pathogen detection. This strategy can also provide important technical support for future research on plant-microbial microenvironments. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.