Science

Steinmetz and her colleagues began the new study by cultivating black-eyed pea plants in the lab and infecting them with the cowpea mosaic virus. The virus went to work replicating itself, creating millions of new copies for the researchers to collect.

Steinmetz notes that the resulting nanoparticles were already suitable for administering to mice in the experiments and required no modifications. They are "nature's powerful nanoparticles, as produced in black-eyed pea plants," she says.

That's great! We only have to help the mice to cultivate it.