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Agronomy
Special Issues
Environmental Ecological Remediation and Farming Sustainability—3rd Edition
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Environmental Ecological Remediation and Farming Sustainability—3rd Edition

A special issue of Agronomy (ISSN 2073-4395).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 25 September 2025 | Viewed by 3555

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Haoming Chen

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Laboratory of Environmental Ecological Remediation and Planning, School of Environmental and Biological Engineering, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing 210094, China
Interests: agricultural soil improvement; biochar; heavy metal stress; soil environmental chemistry; environmental contamination and remediation; agricultural solid waste resource utilization; environmental bioremediation; soil science and soil reclamation; soil amendments; soil and groundwater remediation techniques; risk assessment of contaminated sites; ecological planning; agricultural landscape planning
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Da Tian

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Anhui Province Key Laboratory of Farmland Conservation and Pollution Prevention, School of Resources and Environment, Anhui Agricultural University, 130 Changjiangxilu Street, Hefei 230036, China
Interests: soil science; farmland conservation and pollution prevention; phosphorus efficient utilization and water environment protection; applied microbiology; phosphate-solubilizing fungi; heavy metal remediation; bioremediation
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Environmental pollution caused by anthropogenic substances or the uncontrolled utilization of natural resources has become a global problem threatening agricultural ecology and food security. Maintaining a healthy agricultural ecosystem is critical to ensuring a healthy future. The substantial efforts made in this field have become significant in the research of mitigating or remediating environmental pollution, especially in agricultural research.

To date, multiple innovative technologies related to environmental mitigation/remediation, including physical/chemical remediation, multiple-compound adsorbent, and bioremediation technology, have been developed and validated to better protect soil, water, and atmosphere environments. Additionally, macro-environmental and ecological planning increasingly play an important role in guiding environmental restoration. However, a range of research gaps have not been filled. Therefore, it is urgent to combine the latest environmental pollution problems with advanced remediation technology to develop new technologies to protect the environment.

Furthermore, with the continuous emergence of emerging pollutants and the innovative application of artificial intelligence (AI) technology in agricultural environmental remediation, a series of new research hotspots are gradually emerging. These encompass utilizing AI for the efficient and precise detection of emerging pollutants, optimizing remediation strategies to enhance efficiency, constructing intelligent pollution warning systems, and developing smart ecological planning tools, all aimed at comprehensively promoting the sustainable development of the agricultural ecological environment. These cutting-edge explorations will undoubtedly become important directions and hot topics in future scientific research.

This Special Issue focuses on the current situation of environmental ecological remediation and farming sustainability, and helps to mitigate environmental pollution from the micro and macro levels.

New research articles, reviews, and case reports are welcome in this Special Issue. Manuscripts dealing with new approaches to applying novel remediation technology, remediation mechanisms and influencing factors, risk assessment, and management are also welcome.

We encourage prospective authors to submit related distinguished research manuscripts focused on (but not limited to) the following topics:

  • Material development for soil remediation;
  • Water pollution remediation improvement technologies;
  • Bioremediation technology application;
  • Urban and rural ecological sustainability strategies;
  • Farmland conservation and P comprehensive utilization;
  • Biodiversity and ecosystem service;
  • Soil fertility and solid waste utilization;
  • Carbon and nitrogen cycles and climate change;
  • Emerging pollutant detection and AI-assisted identification technology;
  • AI optimization of environmental pollution remediation strategies;
  • Agricultural environmental pollution warning system based on big data and AI;
  • AI-driven ecological planning and decision support system.

Dr. Haoming Chen
Dr. Da Tian
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 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

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 monthly 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

  • soil contamination groundwater contamination
  • green and sustainable remediation
  • environment pollution control
  • heavy metals
  • organic pollutants
  • emerging contaminants
  • biochar
  • remediation of cultivated land pollution
  • crop growth safety
  • p comprehensive utilization
  • reuse of agricultural waste
  • sustainable agricultural development
  • ecological and landscape planning
  • human settlements

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Related Special Issue

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

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12 pages, 2664 KiB  
Article
Heavy Metal Immobilization by Phosphate-Solubilizing Fungus and Phosphogypsum Under the Co-Existence of Pb(II) and Cd(II)
by Xu Li, Zhenyu Chao, Haoxuan Li, Jiakai Ji, Xin Sun, Yingxi Chen, Zhengda Li, Zhen Li, Chuanhao Li, Jun Yao and Lan Xiang
Agronomy 2025, 15(7), 1632; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy15071632 - 4 Jul 2025
Abstract
Globally, phosphogypsum (PG) is the primary by-product of the phosphorus industry. Aspergillus niger (A. niger), one of the most powerful types of phosphate-solubilizing fungi (PSF), can secrete organic acids to dissolve the phosphates in PG. This study investigated heavy metal (HM) [...] Read more.
Globally, phosphogypsum (PG) is the primary by-product of the phosphorus industry. Aspergillus niger (A. niger), one of the most powerful types of phosphate-solubilizing fungi (PSF), can secrete organic acids to dissolve the phosphates in PG. This study investigated heavy metal (HM) remediation by PG and A. niger under the co-existence of Pb and Cd. It demonstrated that 1 mmol/L Pb2+ stimulated the bioactivity of A. niger during incubation, based on the CO2 emission rate. PG successfully functioned as P source for the fungus, and promoted the growth of the fungal cells. Meanwhile, it also provided sulfates to immobilize Pb in the solution. The subsequently generated anglesite was confirmed using SEM imaging. The immobilization rate of Pb reached over 95%. Under co-existence, Pb2+ and 0.01 mmol/L Cd2+ maximized the stimulating effect of A. niger. However, the biotoxicity of Pb2+ and elevated Cd2+ (0.1 mmol/L) counterbalanced the stimulating effect. Finally, 1 mmol/L Cd2+ dramatically reduced the fungal activity. In addition, organic matters from the debris of A. niger could still bind Pb2+ and Cd2+ according to the significantly lowered water-soluble Pb and Cd concentrations. In all treatments with the addition of Cd2+, the relatively high biotoxicity of Cd2+ induced A. niger to absorb more Pb2+ to minimize the sorption of Cd2+ based on the XRD results. The functional group analysis of ATR-IR also confirmed the phenomenon. This pathway maintained the stability of Pb2+ immobilization using the fungus and PG. This study, hence, shed light on the application of A. niger and solid waste PG to remediate the pollution of Pb and Cd. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Environmental Ecological Remediation and Farming Sustainability—3rd Edition)
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16 pages, 3036 KiB  
Article
Bibliometric Analysis of Contemporary Research on the Amelioration of Saline Soils
by Hui Zhang, Yuancai Wang, Lichang Liu, Jiayi Zhou, Qun Wan, Ji Chen, Yaoyao Cao, Leigang Zhang, Fayun Feng, Qi Ning and Xiangyang Yu
Agronomy 2024, 14(12), 2935; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy14122935 - 9 Dec 2024
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1281
Abstract
The decreasing availability of agricultural land, coupled with the growing global population, presents significant challenges worldwide. Reclaiming saline–alkali soil offers a promising solution to alleviate these challenges. Improving and utilizing saline soils present ecological challenges that are influenced by both technological advancements and [...] Read more.
The decreasing availability of agricultural land, coupled with the growing global population, presents significant challenges worldwide. Reclaiming saline–alkali soil offers a promising solution to alleviate these challenges. Improving and utilizing saline soils present ecological challenges that are influenced by both technological advancements and socio-economic factors. This study presents a bibliometric analysis of the published research on saline soil remediation and reclamation from 1985 to the present, using data indexed by the Web of Science Core Collection: Science Citation Index Expanded and Social Science Citation Index. This analysis includes 16,729 publications, which indicate that, over the years, many scientists have conducted extensive research on enhancing and using sodic lands. Countries like the United States, China, Australia, Pakistan, Poland, India, Egypt, and Israel have been pioneers in this field. Furthermore, we summarize trends in this research area, highlighting how strategies for saline soil reclamation have evolved from physical and chemical remediation to salt-tolerant crop breeding and bioremediation applications. With the advancements in science and technology, more methods and strategies have become available to facilitate saline soil remediation. Consequently, management strategies combining multiple technologies will become more effective and provide powerful approaches for reclaiming arable soil from high-salinity marginal lands. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Environmental Ecological Remediation and Farming Sustainability—3rd Edition)
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8 pages, 745 KiB  
Communication
Heavy Metal Remediation Using Phosphate-Solubilizing Fungi: From Bioprocess to Application
by Da Tian, Shuo Zhang, Dechao Wang, Liangliang Zhang, Haoming Chen and Xinxin Ye
Agronomy 2024, 14(11), 2638; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy14112638 - 8 Nov 2024
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1228
Abstract
Heavy metal pollution has been a major environmental issue in recent years, seriously threatening land, water sources, agriculture, and human health. The remediation of heavy metal pollution has been a continuously vital issue for current research. Bioremediation is an effective and cost-efficient approach [...] Read more.
Heavy metal pollution has been a major environmental issue in recent years, seriously threatening land, water sources, agriculture, and human health. The remediation of heavy metal pollution has been a continuously vital issue for current research. Bioremediation is an effective and cost-efficient approach to reduce heavy metal toxicity. Phosphate-solubilizing fungi (PSF) have shown promise in heavy metal bioremediation due to their high tolerance and activity levels. However, the full potential of PSF in bioremediation needs further exploration. PSF activity, metabolite production, and environmental conditions can influence their efficiency in remediating heavy metals. These factors play a critical role in the practical application of PSF and necessitate improvement pathways. This article reviews potential strategies to enhance heavy metal remediation using PSF and optimizing bioprocesses and applications. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Environmental Ecological Remediation and Farming Sustainability—3rd Edition)
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Review

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25 pages, 962 KiB  
Review
Xeno-Fungusphere: Fungal-Enhanced Microbial Fuel Cells for Agricultural Remediation with a Focus on Medicinal Plants
by Da-Cheng Hao, Xuanqi Li, Yaoxuan Wang, Jie Li, Chengxun Li and Peigen Xiao
Agronomy 2025, 15(6), 1392; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy15061392 - 5 Jun 2025
Viewed by 545
Abstract
The xeno-fungusphere, a novel microbial ecosystem formed by integrating exogenous fungi, indigenous soil microbiota, and electroactive microorganisms within microbial fuel cells (MFCs), offers a transformative approach for agricultural remediation and medicinal plant conservation. By leveraging fungal enzymatic versatility (e.g., laccases, cytochrome P450s) and [...] Read more.
The xeno-fungusphere, a novel microbial ecosystem formed by integrating exogenous fungi, indigenous soil microbiota, and electroactive microorganisms within microbial fuel cells (MFCs), offers a transformative approach for agricultural remediation and medicinal plant conservation. By leveraging fungal enzymatic versatility (e.g., laccases, cytochrome P450s) and conductive hyphae, this system achieves dual benefits. First, it enables efficient degradation of recalcitrant agrochemicals, such as haloxyfop-P, with a removal efficiency of 97.9% (vs. 72.4% by fungi alone) and a 27.6% reduction in activation energy. This is driven by a bioelectric field (0.2–0.5 V/cm), which enhances enzymatic activity and accelerates electron transfer. Second, it generates bioelectricity, up to 9.3 μW/cm2, demonstrating real-world applicability. In medicinal plant soils, xeno-fungusphere MFCs restore soil health by stabilizing the pH, enriching dehydrogenase activity, and promoting nutrient cycling, thereby mitigating agrochemical-induced inhibition of secondary metabolite synthesis (e.g., ginsenosides, taxol). Field trials show 97.9% herbicide removal in 60 days, outperforming conventional methods. Innovations, such as adaptive electrodes, engineered strains, and phytoremediation-integrated systems, have been used to address soil and fungal limitations. This technology bridges sustainable agriculture and bioenergy recovery, offering the dual benefits of soil detoxification and enhanced crop quality. Future IoT-enabled monitoring and circular economy integration promise scalable, precision-based applications for global agroecological resilience. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Environmental Ecological Remediation and Farming Sustainability—3rd Edition)
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