Engineering glowing plants: recent progress and future directions for application-oriented design

Bioluminescence is widespread in fungi and animals but naturally absent from higher plants. Early attempts to generate glowing plants relied on substrate-dependent reporter systems, which limited their relevance to laboratory imaging. Recent advances in synthetic biology and metabolic engineering, particularly reconstruction of the fungal bioluminescence pathway, have enabled the development of autonomously glowing plants without external substrates. Recent studies report notable improvements in brightness, controllability, and regulatory flexibility, as well as the emergence of non-transgenic nanomaterial-based luminescence strategies. Compared with systems developed before, which were mainly restricted to low-intensity signals and proof-of-concept demonstrations, current approaches expand application potential toward ornamental horticulture, educational and artistic installations, and exploratory environmental sensing. Despite these advances, several challenges remain, including metabolic burden, variable stability across developmental and environmental conditions, and ecological and regulatory constraints. Future research should focus on rational optimization strategies that balance light output with plant physiological integrity, implement inducible or tissue-specific expression systems, and integrate ecological risk assessment into technological design. This review summarizes recent progress in luminescent plant engineering, highlights differences between early and current systems in application readiness, and outlines key challenges and future directions for applied plant biotechnology.