Tolerance of some mediterranean crops to copper and zinc : implications in toxic metal clean up.

Abstract

A screening often different Mediterranean crops was carried out to test their tolerance to soils polluted with copper and zinc. The methods for copper and zinc determination in plants have been improved, avoiding the time consuming acid digestion. Results showed that zinc toxicity was higher than copper for the assayed plants. In copper-polluted soils, Lupinus luteus (lupin) 549µgg- 1 and Zea mays (corn) 213µgg- 1 showed the highest amounts dried weight of accumulated metal, mainly detected associated to the root system without significant reduction of biometrical parameters of the plants. In zinccontaminated soils, corn (1304 µgg- 1 ), Triticum durum (wheat) (933 µgg- 1 ) and lupin (654µgg- 1 ) showed the highest amounts of metal accumulated mainly in the roots, and in all cases, without biometrical reduction.