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Toxics
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New Lights on Phytoremediation
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New Lights on Phytoremediation

A special issue of Toxics (ISSN 2305-6304). This special issue belongs to the section "Toxicity Reduction and Environmental Remediation".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (20 March 2023) | Viewed by 20676

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Alexander S. Lukatkin

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Botany, Physiology and Ecology of Plants, N.P. Ogarev Mordovia State University, Bolshevistskaja Str., Saransk 430005, Russia
Interests: plant physiology and biochemistry; heavy metals; abiotic stress impacts; plant growth regulators
Dr. Naser A. Anjum

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Botany, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh 202002 U.P., India
Interests: plant–environment adaptation/interaction; abiotic stress-impact assessment; plant physiology and biochemistry
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Przemyslaw Malec

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Jagiellonian University, Kraków, Poland
Interests: plant biology; environmental science; photosynthesis, abiotic stress adaptation; phytotechnologies
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The quality of major compartments of the environment, including soil and water, is deteriorating with continued inputs therein of innumerable hazardous chemicals including toxic metals and metalloids. Though negligible amounts of these hazardous chemicals are added to soil and water via natural sources, anthropogenic activities are the major input pathways of most of these chemicals to these environmental compartments. The contamination of soil and water with toxic metals and metalloids is a major global concern because once released into soil and water, most toxic metals and metalloids do not undergo microbial or chemical degradation, but they remain persistent for a long time and also exhibit fatal biotoxic consequences.

Compared to numerous physical and chemical approaches, phytoremediation is one of the biological approaches that exploit the inherent capacity of plants and associated microorganisms in order to stabilize, volatilize, metabolize, accumulate, sequester, and/or remediate hazardous chemicals including toxic metals and metalloids, thereby protecting environmental and human health.

This Special Issue of the journal Toxics on “New Lights on Phytoremediation” aims to provide a common platform for environmental engineers, environmental microbiologists, and plant physiologists/molecular biologists to share their research, review, opinion, and perspective articles with the global scientific community. The outcomes of these articles types may help in enlightening the mechanisms underlying exploit the inherent capacity of plants- and associated microorganisms-mediated minimization of toxic metals and metalloids and/or emerging hazardous chemicals in soil and water, important for biotic health.

Major topics/themes to be explored:

(1) Present status of toxic metals and metalloids and/or emerging hazardous chemicals in soil and water;

(2) Major consequences of toxic metals and metalloids and/or emerging hazardous chemicals in soil and water in plants, microbes, and animals;

(3) Critical multi-point comparison among approaches presently employed for the control of concentrations of toxic metals and metalloids and/or emerging hazardous chemicals in soil and water;

(4) Role and mechanisms (physiological/biochemical and molecular) underlying plants- and associated microorganisms-mediated minimization/remediation of toxic metals and metalloids and/or emerging hazardous chemicals in soil and water;

(5) Directed increase in the efficiency of phytoremediation: (a) treatment of biologically active substances of soils and plants (including PGRs); (b) creation of genetically modified organisms with increased resistance to HM and at the same time developing a large biomass;

(6) Approaches (biological and chemical) for acceleration and increments in the volume of toxic metals and metalloids and/or emerging hazardous chemicals in soil and water; and

(7) Knowledge gap on the subject in order to provoke future research in the current direction.

(8) Phytomining and biological methods for the acquisition of rare earth elements

(9) The long-term effects of the use of phytoremediation technologies on the structure and functioning of ecosystems.

(10)Theme/topics proposed by the potential authors

Dr. Alexander S. Lukatkin
Dr. Naser A. Anjum
Dr. Przemyslaw Malec
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. Toxics 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

  • metals
  • metalloids
  • emerging hazardous chemicals
  • environmental contamination
  • soil pollution
  • water pollution
  • remediation
  • phytoremediation
  • plants
  • microorganisms

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Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

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18 pages, 5322 KiB  
Article
Enlightening the Pathway of Phytoremediation: Ecophysiology and X-ray Fluorescence Visualization of Two Chilean Hardwoods Exposed to Excess Copper
by Estefanía Milla-Moreno, Robert Dean Guy and Raju Y. Soolanayakanahally
Toxics 2022, 10(5), 237; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics10050237 - 6 May 2022
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 4068
Abstract
In the present climate emergency due to global warming, we are urged to move away from fossil fuels and pursue a speedy conversion to renewable energy systems. Consequently, copper (Cu) will remain in high demand because it is a highly efficient conductor used [...] Read more.
In the present climate emergency due to global warming, we are urged to move away from fossil fuels and pursue a speedy conversion to renewable energy systems. Consequently, copper (Cu) will remain in high demand because it is a highly efficient conductor used in clean energy systems to generate power from solar, hydro, thermal and wind energy across the world. Chile is the global leader in copper production, but this position has resulted in Chile having several hundred tailing deposits. We grew two Chilean native hardwood species, quillay (Quillaja saponaria Molina) and espino (Vachellia caven (Molina) Seigler & Ebinger, under three increasing Cu levels (0, 50, and 100 µM) for 6 months in a greenhouse setting. We measured growth, photosynthetic performance and elemental contents of leaves and roots to further evaluate their potential for phytoremediation. Growth of quillay was unaffected by Cu treatment but growth of espino was enhanced, as was its photosynthetic performance, indicating that espino may have an unusually high requirement for copper. Excess Cu was mostly restricted to the roots of both species, where X-ray fluorescence (XRF) mapping indicated some tendency for Cu to accumulate in tissues outside the periderm. Calcium oxalate crystals were prominently visible in XRF images of both species. Nickel (but not Cu) showed a concurrent distribution pattern with these crystals. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue New Lights on Phytoremediation)
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17 pages, 3137 KiB  
Article
Differential Uptake and Translocation of Cadmium and Lead by Quinoa: A Multivariate Comparison of Physiological and Oxidative Stress Responses
by Atif A. Bamagoos, Hesham F. Alharby and Ghulam Abbas
Toxics 2022, 10(2), 68; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics10020068 - 4 Feb 2022
Cited by 33 | Viewed by 3024
Abstract
Contamination of soils with cadmium (Cd) and lead (Pb) has emerged as a serious environmental issue that reduces crop productivity. However, the metals tolerance and accumulation potential of quinoa (Chenopodium Quinoa Willd) under the combined stress of Cd and Pb has not [...] Read more.
Contamination of soils with cadmium (Cd) and lead (Pb) has emerged as a serious environmental issue that reduces crop productivity. However, the metals tolerance and accumulation potential of quinoa (Chenopodium Quinoa Willd) under the combined stress of Cd and Pb has not yet been explored. In the present hydroponic study, the physiological and biochemical characteristics of quinoa exposed to Cd and Pb were explored. Four-week-old plants of quinoa genotype ‘Puno’ were grown under different concentrations of Cd (0, 50 and 100 µM), Pb (0, 250 and 500 µM) alone as well as in combinations. The results showed that with increasing Cd and Pb levels in the nutrient solution, the plant biomass, stomatal conductance and chlorophyll contents were decreased. However, the concurrent application of higher concentrations of Cd (100 µM) and Pb (500 µM) caused even more reduction in the plant biomass (more than 50% than the control) and physiological attributes. The combined application of Pb and Cd caused oxidative stress through an overproduction of H2O2 (10-fold) and TBARS (12.5-fold), leading to decrease in membrane stability (52%). The oxidative stress was alleviated by a 7-fold, 10-fold and 9-fold overactivation of superoxide dismutase (SOD), peroxidase (POD) and catalase (CAT), respectively. An excessive uptake of Cd resulted in a limited uptake of Pb and K in the roots and shoots of quinoa plants. The Cd and Pb tolerance and uptake potential of Puno showed its ability to stabilize Cd and Pb in co-contaminated soils. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue New Lights on Phytoremediation)
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Review

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17 pages, 1404 KiB  
Review
Removing Mn, Cu and Fe from Real Wastewaters with Macrophytes: Reviewing the Relationship between Environmental Factors and Plants’ Uptake Capacity
by Eder Carlos Lopes Coimbra and Alisson Carraro Borges
Toxics 2023, 11(2), 158; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics11020158 - 7 Feb 2023
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2350
Abstract
Heavy metal pollution creates environmental health concerns. Among these, iron (Fe), copper (Cu) and manganese (Mn) are commonly found in aquatic environments due to the release of wastewaters. Phytoremediation in hydroponics uses macrophytes to treat contaminated environments, and this is influenced by environmental [...] Read more.
Heavy metal pollution creates environmental health concerns. Among these, iron (Fe), copper (Cu) and manganese (Mn) are commonly found in aquatic environments due to the release of wastewaters. Phytoremediation in hydroponics uses macrophytes to treat contaminated environments, and this is influenced by environmental factors. However, the relationship between these factors and the removal of Fe, Cu and Mn by macrophytes is not known. Therefore, a meta-analysis serves to determine the correlations between environmental factors and the removal of these metals in real wastewater by macrophytes, as well as to identify the role of different aquatic forms of macrophytes in phytoremediation. Emergent macrophytes had higher concentrations of manganese in their tissues, and higher bioconcentrations factor of iron and manganese than floating plants. Regardless of the biotope, higher concentrations of Fe and Cu decreased the ability of plants to bioconcentrate them. The correlations among exposure time, pH, dissolved oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus, photoperiod and metal phytoremediation by plants were also found. It can be concluded that the emergent macrophytes showed better performance in terms of the removal of Fe, Cu and Mn, and that the significant correlations between environmental factors and removal vary with the type of metal and the environmental factor analyzed. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue New Lights on Phytoremediation)
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16 pages, 1972 KiB  
Review
Microalgal Phycoremediation: A Glimpse into a Sustainable Environment
by Biswajita Pradhan, Prajna Paramita Bhuyan, Rabindra Nayak, Srimanta Patra, Chhandashree Behera, Jang-Seu Ki, Andrea Ragusa, Alexander S. Lukatkin and Mrutyunjay Jena
Toxics 2022, 10(9), 525; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics10090525 - 6 Sep 2022
Cited by 20 | Viewed by 3956
Abstract
Microalgae are continually exposed to heavy metals and metalloids (HMMs), which stifles their development and reproduction due to the resulting physiological and metabolic abnormalities, leading to lower crop productivity. They must thus change their way of adapting to survive in such a hostile [...] Read more.
Microalgae are continually exposed to heavy metals and metalloids (HMMs), which stifles their development and reproduction due to the resulting physiological and metabolic abnormalities, leading to lower crop productivity. They must thus change their way of adapting to survive in such a hostile environment without sacrificing their healthy growth, development, reproductive capacity, or survival. The mode of adaptation involves a complex relationship of signalling cascades that govern gene expression at the transcriptional and post-transcriptional levels, which consequently produces altered but adapted biochemical and physiochemical parameters. Algae have been reported to have altered their physicochemical and molecular perspectives as a result of exposure to a variety of HMMs. Hence, in this review, we focused on how microalgae alter their physicochemical and molecular characteristics as a tolerance mechanism in response to HMM-induced stress. Furthermore, physiological and biotechnological methods can be used to enhance extracellular absorption and clean up. The introduction of foreign DNA into microalgae cells and the genetic alteration of genes can boost the bio-accumulation and remediation capabilities of microalgae. In this regard, microalgae represent an excellent model organism and could be used for HMM removal in the near future. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue New Lights on Phytoremediation)
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20 pages, 2159 KiB  
Review
Recent Advances in Minimizing Cadmium Accumulation in Wheat
by Min Zhou and Zhengguo Li
Toxics 2022, 10(4), 187; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxics10040187 - 12 Apr 2022
Cited by 25 | Viewed by 5579
Abstract
Cadmium (Cd), a toxic heavy metal, affects the yield and quality of crops. Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) can accumulate high Cd content in the grain, which poses a major worldwide hazard to human health. Advances in our understanding of Cd toxicity for [...] Read more.
Cadmium (Cd), a toxic heavy metal, affects the yield and quality of crops. Wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) can accumulate high Cd content in the grain, which poses a major worldwide hazard to human health. Advances in our understanding of Cd toxicity for plants and humans, different parameters influencing Cd uptake and accumulation, as well as phytoremediation technologies to relieve Cd pollution in wheat have been made very recently. In particular, the molecular mechanisms of wheat under Cd stress have been increasingly recognized. In this review, we focus on the recently described omics and functional genes uncovering Cd stress, as well as different mitigation strategies to reduce Cd toxicity in wheat. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue New Lights on Phytoremediation)
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