The Palliative Effect of Bio-Organic Fertilizer on Lead Pollution in Lycopersicum esculentum Plants

Abstract

Lead is one of the hazardous heavy metal pollutants of the environment that originates from various sources. Soil contamination by lead reduces the quality of both soil and cultivated plants which often limits the production of some food products and animal feed. Thus, this study was undertaken to evaluate the effect of a bio-organic fertilizer, namely Acadian, a red algal extract, at recommended dose (RD) in alleviating the deteriorative effect of Pb at 0, 50, 100, 200 and 400 mg/l on tomato (Lycopersicum esculentum) plants. Accordingly, Pb-treated plants showed marked reductions in growth measurements as root and shoot length, fresh and dry weights of shoots,roots and fruits as well as number of leaves and fruits; in photosynthetic rates, stomatal conductance, net intercellular CO? rates (?CO?) and in the contents of each of chlorophyll a, b and total chlorophyll.In addition, with the increase in level of Pb treatment in situ, total sugars, total nitrogen, catalase activity and major nutrient elements (P, K, Ca and Mg) were proportionally declined in both shoots and roots as well as proline of roots. At the other side, Pb treatment raised the levels of each of carotenoids, total soluble sugars, amino nitrogen, total soluble nitrogen, peroxidase, superoxide dismutase, phenols, lipid peroxidation, sodium, lead and iron in both roots and shoots of tomato plants as well as proline of shoots and transpiration rates. When tomato plants were supplemented with the recommended dose of Acadian solely or combined with Pb at all rates, significant increases in all measured growth parameters (shoot and root length, fresh and dry weights of shoots, roots and fruits, number of leaves and fruits), photosynthetic rates, stomatal conductance, ?CO?, the contents of each of chlorophyll a, b, total chlorophyll as well as the contents of total sugars, total soluble sugars, total nitrogen, total soluble nitrogen, amino-N, P, K, Ca and Mg in tomato shoots and roots were obtained. Conversely, Acadian fertilization negatively reduced the carotenoid values, the activity of antioxidant enzymes(catalase, peroxidase and superoxide dismutase), the amounts of phenol, Pb, Na, Fe and the level of lipid peroxidation in both shoots and roots of tomato plants, whereas, it positively affected transpiration rates. On the otherside, when Acadian where added to lead at different rates there were either synergistic increases in the activities of these antioxidant enzymes and the level of phenol and lipid peroxidation or decreases in the carotenoid, Na, Fe and Pb contents as well as transpiration rates. Thus, it is manifested that Acadian can be used to improve the safety, quality and productivity of lead polluted plants.

The potential of Moringa oleifera extract as a biostimulant in enhancing the growth, biochemical and hormonal contents in rocket (Eruca vesicaria subsp. sativa) plants

“…Several comparable studies confirmed the current data. For instance, Schuphan (2005), Noori et al (2010), Sivakumar and Ponnusami (2011) and Abdalla and El-Khoshiban, (2012) realized the increased uptake and accumulations of some nutritive elements as N, K, Ca, Mg, P as well as Fe in roots and shoots of several plants under investigation as a consequence of organic fertilization from different sources (plant and animal source) including Moringa leaf extract. Sivakumar and Ponnusami (2011) indicated that organic manures are fairly good source of nutrients which boosted plants to uptake progressively beneficial elements, to increase the leaf nutrient status and eventually attain optimum growth and productivity.…”

“…In addition, spraying rocket plants with the twig extract at the three rates 1, 2 and 3% elicited gradual increases in the amounts of these photosynthetic pigments but these increases were comparably less than those of Moringa leaf extract. Corroborative data were obtained using different types of organic fertilizers as compost, vermincompost, animal manure and seaweeds (Amujoyegbe et al, 2007;Noori et al, 2010;Abdalla and El-Khoshiban, 2012). The present knowledge ascertained that Moringa (leaves, seeds, pods) contains appreciable amounts of specific plant pigments with demonstrated potent antioxidant properties such as the carotenoids (lutein, alphacarotene, beta-carotene and xanthin) and chlorophyll (Owusu, 2008).…”

Mitigation of Lead Stress in Triticum aestivum by Seed Priming in Aqueous Extracts of The Macroalgea Halimeda opuntia and Codium fragile

“…Afaf A. Nessem # and Rania A. El-shenody Botany Department, Faculty of Science, Tanta University, Tanta, Egypt. AFAF A. NESSEM AND RANIA A. EL-SHENODY positively reduce the levels of lead and cadmium in plants as well as conductivity of soil but raised its pH (Abdalla & El-Khoshiban, 2012).…”

Effects of moringa leaf extract on growth and yield of maize

“…Moringa leaves are potential source of vitamin A and C, iron, calcium, riboflavin, b-carotene, phenolics (Nambiar et al, 2005) and powerful natural antioxidants (Njoku and Adikwu, 1997). Now-a-days, moringa plant has attained enormous attention because of having cytokinin, antioxidants, macro and micro nutrients in its leaves (Abdalla and El-Khoshiban, 2012;Abdalla, 2013). Moringa has proved to be a potential source for research as scientists have moved their focus to this "Miracle tree".…”