Plants as bioassay systems for monitoring atmospheric pollutants
Plant species act as natural bioindicators of atmospheric pollutants. Plants can be used as bioassay systems for monitoring atmospheric pollutants. Plant injury symptoms, altered growth and reproductive pattern, changes in yield and/or productivity, and changes in species distribution can be used singly or in combination as monitoring devices. The results must be accepted as semiquantitative, but within that constraint, air quality can be sufficiently well defined to enable the setting of air quality standards. Genetic variability of higher plant species has yielded cultivars which display a range of tolerance to gaseous and particulate atmospheric pollutants. Asexual propagation of these cultivars provides pollutant-sensitive and pollutant-tolerant plant material which can be grown on selected sites for observation. Gymnosperm and Angiosperm species as well as species of lichens and mosses have been used to establish field monitoring networks in Europe, Canada, and the United States. White pine, shade tobacco, mosses, and lichens have proven particularly useful as bioassay tools. Pollen from pollutant-sensitive and pollutant-tolerant plant cultivars has also been used as a sensitive laboratory bioassay tool for studying air quality. Epiphytic mosses are particularly efficient as monitors of particulate pollutants, especially heavy metals, some of which may act as chemical mutagens. The cost, complexity, and lack of reliability of instrumented systems for air quality monitoring make imperative the need to develop successful plant bioassay systems for monitoring air quality.
- Research Organization:
- Univ. of Massachusetts, Waltham
- OSTI ID:
- 5553327
- Journal Information:
- Environ. Health Perspect.; (United States), Vol. 27
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Related Subjects
54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES
AIR POLLUTION
BIOLOGICAL INDICATORS
AIR POLLUTION MONITORING
AIR QUALITY
BIOASSAY
CANADA
EUROPE
INHIBITION
INJURIES
LICHENS
MOSSES
NICOTIANA
PARTICULATES
PINES
PLANT GROWTH
PLANTS
POPULATIONS
PRODUCTIVITY
SENSITIVITY
SYMPTOMS
USA
VARIATIONS
ALGAE
CONIFERS
ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY
FUNGI
GROWTH
MONITORING
NORTH AMERICA
PARTICLES
POLLUTION
TREES
560303* - Chemicals Metabolism & Toxicology- Plants- (-1987)
500200 - Environment
Atmospheric- Chemicals Monitoring & Transport- (-1989)