Pollutants in Crops: Bioavailability, Safety, and Impact on Agronomic Management
A special issue of Agronomy (ISSN 2073-4395). This special issue belongs to the section "Soil and Plant Nutrition".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 July 2026 | Viewed by 271
Special Issue Editors
Interests: environmental contaminants; heavy metals; pesticides; polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons; risk assessment
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Pollutants in agricultural systems arise from diverse natural and anthropogenic sources, including contaminated soils, irrigation water, agrochemicals, industrial deposition, and recycled organic inputs. As crops grow, these pollutants interact with soil, plants, and the wider agroecosystem, exhibiting complex physicochemical behaviors that determine their mobility, bioavailability, and eventual accumulation in plant tissues.
The presence of pollutants in crops poses challenges for food and feed safety, soil health, crop productivity, and sustainable agronomic management. Understanding the pathways through which pollutants enter and move within the soil–plant system is essential for safeguarding crop quality and designing effective management strategies.
This Special Issue aims to highlight recent advances in understanding the behavior, uptake, and mitigation of pollutants within agricultural cropping systems. It seeks contributions that explore the mechanisms controlling pollutant bioavailability in soils, the physiological and biochemical responses of crops to pollutant exposure, and the safety implications for agricultural products. Submissions addressing the development of agronomic, technological, or ecological strategies to reduce pollutant accumulation in crops are of particular interest, reflecting the journal’s focus on soil–plant interactions, sustainable agronomy, and agroecological management.
The Guest Editors welcome submissions that foster the development of safe, high-performance, and environmentally responsible cropping systems by integrating scientific knowledge with actionable agronomic practices.
Dr. Alina Daria Soceanu
Dr. Dobrinas Simona
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Agronomy is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- pollutant
- crop safety
- soil–plant system
- pollutant uptake
- sustainable agronomy
- agrochemicals
- food and feed safety
- agroecological management
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