Abstract
Purpose
Lanthanides, including La, Ce, and Nd, as members of the rare-earth elements (REE) group, continue to attract the attention of researchers. Particularly lacking is data on REE toxicity in soil, which may affect specific soil types differently depending on their properties. Toxicity studies on REE-contaminated soil are therefore needed to assess the likely effects of anthropogenic impacts and to set safe content limits. In this study, we assess the potential toxicity of soil samples with a high organic matter content — chernozem — spiked with La, Ce, and Nd.
Methods
The toxicity of soil samples was assessed using the Allium test on three basic indicators — root length of bulbs germinated on the samples, mitotic activity of cells in the apical meristem (mitotic index (MI)), and the frequency of aberrant cells (FAC). Allium cepa L. bulbs were germinated on soil samples with extraneous lanthanide concentrations from 0 (control) to 200 mg/kg.
Results
It was difficult to identify a single pattern for La, Ce, and Nd in their influence on onion root length when a range of concentrations are added to chernozem samples. The significant decrease in MI in the experimental groups of 20 and 100 mg/kg La compared with the control and the significant increase in FAC in the experimental group of 100 and 200 mg/kg Ce compared with the group of 10 mg/kg were shown.
Conclusion
The properties of chernozem can largely limit the potential toxicity of La, Ce, and Nd introduced into soil samples in the form of chlorides. The results of REE toxicity assessment studies allow us to place them in an appropriate row, in which the potential toxicity decreases: Ce > Nd > La.
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Abbreviations
- RREs:
-
Rare-earth elements
- MI:
-
Mitotic index
- FAC:
-
Frequency of aberrant cells
- PE:
-
Phytotoxic effect
- ME:
-
Mitotoxic effect
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The reported study was funded by RFBR (Russian Foundation for Basic Research), project number 19–05-50016.
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Anna Kotelnikova: writing — original draft, investigation, visualization, conceptualization, methodology, formal analysis, data curation, writing — review and editing. Olga Rogova: resources, project administration, writing — review and editing, supervision, funding acquisition. Dmitry S. Volkov: resources, funding acquisition, writing — review and editing.
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Kotelnikova, A., Rogova, O. & Volkov, D.S. Toxicity assessment update for soil spiked with lanthanides (La, Ce, and Nd): results for chernozem. J Soils Sediments 22, 1188–1200 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-022-03147-6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-022-03147-6