Scientific publications

The problem of phytoremediation of territories exposed to the influence of non-ferrous metallurgy enterprises is currently extremely hot. Results of the study reflecting the influence of the soil of technogenic wasteland on selected parameters of the red fescue (Festuca rubra L.), which is a metal-tolerant species of cereals, are presented in the article. The samples of technogenic soils were taken near the copper-nickel combine (Monchegorsk, Murmansk region, Russia). The experiment consisted of 4 series, where the red fescue was grown on such substrates as technogenic soils, a mixture of the soils with control peat in the ratio 1:1 and 1:3, and control peat. The studied parameters included: the chemical composition of plants and soils (forms available to plants), the height and the weight of plants, the fluorescence of chlorophyll a, the content of photosynthetic pigments. The total copper content in the technogenic soil was 6,4 g/kg, nickel 1,6 g/kg. This peat was highly toxic. The plants did not sprout in such conditions. The content of elements in the soil in other series of experiments depended on the concentration of technogenic components and the pH value-directly proportional to Cu, Ni and other heavy metals and was inverse proportional for K, P, Mg, Ca. Fescue leaves in the series with 50 % addition of the technogenic soil contained heavy metals in extremely high concentrations - 300 mg/kg for nickel and 190 mg/kg for copper. The addition of the anthropogenic soil in the ratio 1:3 strengthened the growth processes, which led to an increased accumulation of the biomass and a rather high activity of photosynthetic apparatus. The soil mixture, 50 % of which was technogenic peat, had an inhibitory effect on the accumulation of the biomass and the activity of the photosynthetic apparatus, which may be explained by the inhibition of the light phase of photosynthesis. The obtained results showed that the red fescue is capable of active accumulation of heavy metals from a substrate with a multi-element contamination and in connection with this it can be used for cleaning soils of copper-nickel enterprises. This species is resistant to the action of heavy metals and, therefore, can be successfully used for phytoremediation purposes.