Khaai ke Paan Banaras Wala: A prophecy!

Yashvi Bhatt – 24th November, 2025

This iconic song may just be the most accurate prophecy when it comes to neurotherapeutics.

I mean, when they said “Khai ke paan Banaras wala khul jae bandh akal ka taala”, they foresaw the advent of plant-based neurotherapeutic delivery systems!

When you think “drug delivery to the brain,” plant cells are probably the last things that come to mind – and you’re not alone! But as it turns out, they might be exactly what neurons and glia (the brain cells that take care of immunity, myelin sheath* formation, and overall brain health) yearn for!

Plants release tiny lipid bubbles called nanovesicles – exosome**-like particles loaded with fats, RNAs, proteins, and other metabolites. You can isolate them from cultured plant tissues just like mammalian exosomes.

That’s the magic: no animal serum, no ethical melodrama, no viral vectors. Just cell cultures from tea leaves or oats coming to the brain’s rescue.

One group showed that oats-derived nanovesicles were gobbled up by microglia (the brain’s chief immune cells) in mice exposed to ethanol.

This acted like a “take a chill-pill” signal for the microglia – which resulted in less inflammatory signaling and less collateral neural damage.

You’re basically weaponizing plant vesicles to coach resident immune cells into behaving better. No forced genetic edits, no heavy immunosuppressants… just some Filmfare-worthy botanical diplomacy.

Mechanistically, they deliver bioactive cargo – lipid fingerprints, small RNAs, nutrient metabolites directly into neural or glial cells.

Think about how that could scale:

• vesicles engineered to carry neuroprotective peptides,

• vesicles delivering antioxidant payloads to neurons under stress,

• vesicles steering microglia away from inflammatory gear into a pro-repair state.

For neurodegeneration, trauma, or addiction biology, this shifts the game: Plants aren’t passive pharmaco-factories anymore – they’re delivery platforms. So kinda like an “endto-end” solution for all your therapeutic needs!!

They don’t just make molecules; they package them into nanosystems that cells naturally take in.

Give it 3-5 years, and these vesicles will be all over neuro-repair papers. And the best part? Your “brain therapy vector” could literally originate from a plant tissue culture flask at InXITU!

Myelin sheath is a coating around the body of a neuron which makes conduction of an electrical impulse more efficient! In fact, the “white matter” in your brain is basically just myelinated neurons! * The word “exosome” literally originates from “exo-” meaning outside and “-soma” meaning body. Exosomes are nano-sized particles released by cells to communicate to neighbouring cells. These are biologically designed to carry cargo – which does the conversation part.

References: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12951-023-02193-7 and https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fmre.2023.09.007