Seasonal variation in tissue-borne heavy metal(loid)s in herbaceous plants growing in contaminated soils developed from industrial wastes of Industrial Revolution age

Nworie, OE; Lin, C

Abstract

A 1-year monitoring program was performed to examine the seasonal variation in shoot-borne heavy metal(loid)s in a dominant herbaceous plant species (creeping bentgrass) growing in contaminated soils developed from industrial wastes of Industrial Revolution age in Greater Manchester, UK. Heavy metal(loid)s in soil and plant tissues were quantified by inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry (ICP-OES) after microwave-assisted acid digestion. The results show that different heavy metal(loid)s in the shoot tissue had different seasonal variation patterns. Seasonal shoot cutting-regrowth did not markedly affect the accumulation of various heavy metal(loid)s in the shoots. The concentration of shoot-borne heavy metal(loid)s was below the maximum tolerable level set for cattle except for Cd during spring-summer. The seasonal variation pattern for removal rate of Cd, Cr, Cu, Pb and Zn was strongly controlled by seasonal variation in biomass yield. The heavy metal(loid) removal from the soils via seasonal shoot harvest was 0.11, 0.56, 0.57, 3.56, 60.4, 0.34, 0.27 and 12.3 mg/m2 for As, Cd, Cr, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn, respectively. It is estimated that during the 1-year monitoring period, only 0.0002, 0.4014, 0.0142, 0.0423, 0.1627, 0.0154, 0.0008 and 0.1840% of the total metal(loid)s were removed from the soil by the plant shoots for As, Cd, Cr, Cu, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn, respectively. Phytoextraction literally had negligible effects on removing the investigated heavy metal(loid)s from the contaminated soils except for Cd, Mn and Zn. The average bioaccumulation factor for the investigated heavy metal(loid)s was in the following decreasing order: Zn > Mn > Cu > Cr > Ni > Cd > Pb > As. The translocation factor for Cd was over 10 under either non-regrowth or cutting-regrowth conditions although the bioaccumulation factor was smaller than 0.5. The research findings obtained from this study have implications for risk assessment and management of the industrial waste-turned contaminated soils.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Sep 9, 2021
• Online Publication Date: Sep 10, 2021
• Publication Date: Oct 1, 2021
• Deposit Date: Sep 13, 2021
• Publicly Available Date: Sep 13, 2021
• Journal: Environmental Advances
• Print ISSN: 2666-7657
• Electronic ISSN: 2666-7657
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Volume: 5
• Pages: 100113
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envadv.2021.100113
• Publisher URL: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envadv.2021.100113
• Related Public URLs: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/environmental-advances
• Additional Information: Additional Information : ** Article version: AM ** From Elsevier via Jisc Publications Router ** Licence for AM version of this article starting on 09-09-2021: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ **Journal IDs: issn 26667657 **History: issued 10-09-2021