Remediation of heavy metal contaminated soil

Abstract

The worldwide awareness of the deleterious effects of heavy metal pollution has resulted in intensive research aiming at understanding metal interactions in soil and their removal in an efficient way. Although, the knowledge and practice of the conventional physio-chemical remedial technologies for degraded soils are age-old, they are not in demonstration these days due to their detrimental impact on various ecosystems. On the other hand, phytoremediation has received much attention as a biological and natural way of treating the polluted lands. In addition, augmentation of essential rhizobacteria to reduce phytotoxicity and remediating metal polluted soils has also gained interest. This paper investigates the plant-microbial interactions in reclaiming the metal contaminated soil with attention to some significant soil biochemical characteristics during the process.

Keywords: Heavy metals, bioremediation, phytoremediation, rhizosphere, rhizobacteria, bioaugmentation

African Journal of Biotechnology Vol. 12(21), pp. 3099-3109,