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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Environ. Sci.
Sec. Toxicology, Pollution and the Environment
Volume 12 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fenvs.2024.1380867
This article is part of the Research Topic Remediation and Health Risks of Heavy Metal Contaminated Soils View all 13 articles

Improving the Growth of Pea Plant by Biochar-Polyacrylamide Association to Cope with Heavy Metal Stress under Sewage Water Application in a Greenhouse

Provisionally accepted
Muhammad Naveed Muhammad Naveed 1Maryum Fatima Maryum Fatima 1Zainab Naseem Zainab Naseem 1Zulfiqar Ahmad Zulfiqar Ahmad 1Abdel-Rhman Gaafar Abdel-Rhman Gaafar 2Mubashra Shabbir Mubashra Shabbir 3Qurrat Ul Ain Farooq Qurrat Ul Ain Farooq 4Mohamed S. Hodhod Mohamed S. Hodhod 5Muhammad Imran Khan Muhammad Imran Khan 1Dua Shahid Dua Shahid 6Adnan Mustafa Adnan Mustafa 6*
  • 1 Institute of Soil and Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Agriculture Faisalabad, Faisalabad, Punjab, Pakistan
  • 2 Department of Botany and Microbiology, College of Science, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
  • 3 Punjab Livestock And Dairy Development Department, Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan
  • 4 Harry Butler Institute, Murdoch University, Murdoch, Western Australia, Australia
  • 5 Faculty of Biotechnology, October University for Modern Sciences and Arts, Giza, Cairo, Egypt
  • 6 Key Laboratory of Vegetation Restoration and Management of Degraded Ecosystems, South China Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Guangzhou, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Sewage water is extensively used for irrigation, serving as a valuable resource for plant growth to enhance agricultural productivity. However, this practice also results in a significant accumulation of heavy metals in the soil, posing potential environmental and health concerns. A study was designed to evaluate the combined effect of amendments on heavy metal immobilization in soil and improved growth and yield of pea plants. For this, soil for each treatment was mixed with biochar (BC) (1% w/w), polyacrylamide (PAM) (0.5% w/w), as well as applied in combination. Pea plants were irrigated with tap water (TW), sewage water (SW), and tap + sewage water (TW+SW). A factorial design was applied to analyze data statistically. The combined application of biochar and polymer showed a positive response by significantly enhancing the plant growth parameters (39-84%), physiological attributes (67-69%) and reducing Cd (56%) and Cr (65%) concentration in soil applied with SW and TW+ SW. Moreover, treatment with a combined application of BC and PAM significantly reduced Cd concentrations by 43% in roots, 50% in shoots, and 91% in grains. Similarly, Cr concentrations were reduced by 51% in roots, 51% in shoots, and 94% in grains compared to the control. Overall, our results indicate reduced bioaccumulation and health risks associated with potentially toxic elements (PTE), supporting the application of polymer and biochar for irrigating pea plants with TW+SW. Leveraging the combined benefits of polymer and biochar amendments appears to be an effective strategy to remediate PTE-contaminated soil, thereby increasing plant growth and yield.

    Keywords: polymer, biochar, Pea plant, Phytoremediation, Potentially toxic elements

    Received: 02 Feb 2024; Accepted: 03 Jul 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Naveed, Fatima, Naseem, Ahmad, Gaafar, Shabbir, Farooq, Hodhod, Khan, Shahid and Mustafa. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Adnan Mustafa, Key Laboratory of Vegetation Restoration and Management of Degraded Ecosystems, South China Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Guangzhou, 510650, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.