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Novel and Sustainable Environmental Preservation Strategies for Polluted Solid Matrix

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Pollution Prevention, Mitigation and Sustainability".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 December 2023) | Viewed by 3410

Special Issue Editors

Department of Civil, Environmental, Land, Building Engineering and Chemistry, Polytechnic University of Bari, Via E. Orabona 4, 70125 Bari, Italy
Interests: environmental engineering; soil remediation; bioremediation; anaerobic digestion; waste to energy; waste management; marine-coastal environmental monitoring
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Department of Civil, Environmental, Land, Building Engineering and Chemistry (DICATECh), Polytechnic University of Bari, Via E. Orabona n. 4, 70125 Bari, Italy
Interests: environmental technologies; sustainable materials for environmental remediation; waste and wastewater recovery and recycle; waste characterization and management; recycled waste in the building materials
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
National Salinity Research Center, Agricultural Research, Education and Extension Organization, Yazd 8917357676, Iran
Interests: soil salinity; water salinity; phytoremediation; bioremediation; desalinization

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

In a worldwide perspective, solid matrix (such as soil and sediment) pollution represents a significant issue which poses serious risk to both human health and environmental quality. Moreover, solid matrix contamination further entails social/economical negative effects by invalidating the potential use and activities on agricultural, recreational, and marine-coastal areas due to their environmental deterioration. Therefore, ongoing researches from scientific community aim at assessing efficient approaches for the remediation of solid matrix characterized by inorganic and/or organic form of contamination. Concurrently, the main effort in this research field is to provide treatment strategies displaying significant efficiency in terms of process performance (i.e. high rate of contaminant removal/stabilization) as well as environmentally sustainable applicability and economic affordability. For this, the integration of both technical solutions and management/monitoring supporting strategies is of fundamental importance to achieve effective environmental remediation and consequent site reclamation. According to this, the Special Issue seeks research papers focusing on various aspects of systems for the remediation and proper management of contaminated solid matrix. The aim is to highlight scientific findings representative of novel and interdisciplinary approaches able to identify useful operational activities and support future researches on this topic.

In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome. Research areas may include (but not limited to) the following:

  • Environmentally sustainable treatments (physical-chemical, biological) for contaminated solid matrix remediation
  • Pilot/Full-scale applications of treatment systems
  • Management strategies aimed at defining efficient handling chains from the contaminated solid matrix collection to its environmentally safe disposal/reclamation
  • Monitoring approaches to determine the contamination characteristics and predict/control its evolution over time
  • Novel and sustainable bioremediation techniques for the degradation of organic compounds in contaminated solid matrix
  • Studies on solid matrix contamination based on the combination of interdisciplinary analytics (e.g. microbiological, physical-chemical, statistical, economic, etc.)

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Alberto Ferraro
Dr. Marco Race
Dr. Francesco Todaro
Dr. Hadi Pirasteh-Anosheh
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. Sustainability 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 2400 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 and sediment contamination
  • heavy metals
  • organic pollutants
  • bioremediation
  • physical-chemical treatment
  • risk assessment
  • environmental monitoring
  • desalinization

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

14 pages, 1843 KiB  
Article
Phytoremediation of PAH- and Cu-Contaminated Soil by Cannabis sativa L.: Preliminary Experiments on a Laboratory Scale
by Ilaria Gabriele, Francesco Bianco, Marco Race, Stefano Papirio and Giovanni Esposito
Sustainability 2023, 15(3), 1852; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15031852 - 18 Jan 2023
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 1730
Abstract
This study proposes the phytoremediation of phenanthrene (PHE)-, pyrene (PYR)-, and copper (Cu)-contaminated soil by Cannabis sativa L. The experimental campaign was conducted in 300 mL volume pots over a 50 d period using different initial polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) concentrations, i.e., 100 [...] Read more.
This study proposes the phytoremediation of phenanthrene (PHE)-, pyrene (PYR)-, and copper (Cu)-contaminated soil by Cannabis sativa L. The experimental campaign was conducted in 300 mL volume pots over a 50 d period using different initial polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon (PAH) concentrations, i.e., 100 (PC1), 200 (PC2), and 300 (PC3) mg ƩPAHs kg−1 dry weight of soil, while maintaining a constant Cu concentration of 350 mg∙kg−1. PHE and PYR removal was 93 and 61%, 98 and 48%, and 97 and 36% in PC1, PC2, and PC3, respectively, in the greenhouse condition. The highest Cu extraction amounted to 58 mg∙kg−1. In general, the growth of C. sativa L. under the PC1, PC2, and PC3 conditions decreased by approximately 25, 65, and 71% (dry biomass), respectively, compared to the uncontaminated control. The present study is aimed at highlighting the phytoremediation potential of C. sativa L. and providing the preliminary results necessary for future field-scale investigations. Full article
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13 pages, 2160 KiB  
Article
The Role of Nitrogen in Inducing Salt Stress Tolerance in Crocus sativus L.: Assessment Based on Plant Growth and Ions Distribution in Leaves
by Seyedeh Elahe Hashemi, Shahab Madahhosseini, Hadi Pirasteh-Anosheh, Ebrahim Sedaghati and Marco Race
Sustainability 2023, 15(1), 567; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15010567 - 29 Dec 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1240
Abstract
The role of nitrogen (N) in inducing salt stress tolerance in plants is not well understood, and the question is more complicated in saffron (Crocus sativus L.), which is sensitive to both nitrogen rates and salinity. The present study was conducted to investigate [...] Read more.
The role of nitrogen (N) in inducing salt stress tolerance in plants is not well understood, and the question is more complicated in saffron (Crocus sativus L.), which is sensitive to both nitrogen rates and salinity. The present study was conducted to investigate the effects of different N (0, 50 and 150 kg ha−1) supplies on saffron growth and ions concentration in shoots under several salt stress levels (0, 3, 6 and 9 dS m−1). Salinity negatively affected plant growth assessed by leaves number, leaves length, shoot dry weight, corms number and corms weight. Moreover, there was a clear direct correlation between higher salinity value and less plant growth. Different effects due to salinity and nitrogen were evident in terms of the number and length of leaves during the growing season from day 60 after first irrigation (DAF) and achieved a peak after 90 DAF. Salt stress also affected the ions balance, as Na+, Cl and Ca2+ were enhanced and K+ was reduced, thereby damaging the plants. Nitrogen partially mitigated the negative impacts of salinity on plant growth and ions balance, although this compensatory effect was observed when nitrogen supply was set at 50 kg N ha−1. For example, in 2019–2020, the losses in shoot dry weight due to 9 dS m−1 salinity amounted to 47%, 44% and 54%, at 0, 50 and 100 kg N ha−1 respectively, thus indicating a less negative effect of salinity at 50 kg N ha−1. Moreover, at 100 kg N ha−1 the negative effect of salinity was stronger for six and nine dS m−1. Our findings suggested that the optimum N supply (50 kg N ha−1) strengthened the plant under non-saline and moderately saline (6 dS m−1) conditions, and consequently improved salt tolerance. Full article
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