Thursday, January 7, 2010

The Effects of Lead, Cadmium, Copper andinc on the growth and metal uptake of cauliflower, spanish and parsley


 
Mahmoud Mohammed Isa



In order to assess the intake of lead and cadmium by consumers of some vegetable crops (spinach, parsley, and cauliflower) in Palestine, the metal content of vegetables planted in sewage-irrigated soil at Deersharaf area was compared with that of the same vegetables planted in tub-well (spring water) - irrigated soil in Jenin area and with that planted in tap-water-irrigated soil in Nablus. Chemical analysis indicated that the levels of lead and cadmium in the three types of irrigation water used were below the maximum safe limits (10 mg Cd/L and 50  mg Pb/L) allowed for irrigation. However, the lead content of the waste-water was higher than that of spring water or tap-water which was 43, 10 and 13 mg/L for each type respectively. Chemical analysis of vegetable samples showed only very low concentration of cadmium in vegetables irrigated by waste-water, spring water or tap-water. However, the vegetables grown at Deersharaf area contained considerably higher quantities of lead than that from Jenin or Nablus areas, but the contamination level was still below the safe limit allowed for these metals in food.

The lead uptake by vegetables irrigated with waste-water was highest in parsley (0.659 mg/gm), then in cauliflower (0.405 mg/gm) and least in spinach (0.379 mg/gm. The lead uptake of the same three vegetables irrigated with tub-well water was 0.2406, 0.0794, and 0.1710 mg/gm, respectively. Thus it is obvious that consumers of Deersharaf plants have daily dietary intake of lead more than triple the average intake of plant consumers in Jenin. The effect of treatment of parsley, spinach, and cauliflower plants with cadmium, lead, copper, and zinc have been studied. All the metals were found growth- inhibitors of plants as a whole and of its various parts. Treatment of plants with 1.0-3.0 accumulate -90% of the lead taken by the plant while the shoots of parsley accumulated - 85% and fruits of cauliflower accumulated - 60% of lead. Cadmium taken by the plants was found to accumulate in the leaves of parsley - 60%, leaves of spinach - 80% and the fruits of cauliflower - 60%. The highest lead uptake was found in parsley plants while the highest cadmium uptake was in spinach plants. Only very small fraction of the two metals added during irrigation was taken by plants, the rest was presumably adsorbed in soil.




Mahmoud Mohammed Isa
Supervisors
Dr. Radi Daoud
Dr. Mohammed M. Al-Subu
1994

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