Metal toxicity to certain vegetables and bioremediation of metal-polluted soils

Abstract

The production of quality vegetables is a crucial issue worldwide due to consistently deteriorating soil health. Plants including vegetables absorb a number of metals from soil, some of which have no biological function, but some are toxic at low concentrations, while others are required at low concentration but are toxic at higher concentrations. As vegetables constitute a major source of nutrition and are an important dietary constituent, the heavy metal uptake and bioaccumulation in vegetables is important since it disrupts production and quality of vegetables and consequently affects human health via food chain. Considering the serious threat of metals to vegetables, an attempt in this chapter is made to highlight the effects of certain metals on vegetables grown in different agroclimatic regions of the world. Also, the bioremediation strategies adopted to clean up the metal-contaminated soil is discussed. The results of different studies conducted across the globe on metal toxicity and bioremediation strategies presented in this chapter are likely to help vegetable growers to produce fresh and contaminant-free vegetables.