Toxicity of Nanomaterials in Plants and Environment

Abstract

Nowadays, due to the suitable properties of engineered nanomaterials (NMs), their use in the industries has expanded. The expansion of nanomaterials production will inevitably lead to its release into the environment. The presence of NMs in environment causes harmful effects on plants and aquatic life. Furthermore, engineered nanomaterials (ENMs) can interact with some environmental pollutants (e.g., metals and organic pollutants), which may consequence in a variation of the ecosystem behavior and toxicity of these pollutants. Plants include of a very vital living component of the earthly ecosystem. Research on the impact of ENMs on plant growth illustrated that in the extra content ENMs affect the seed germination. This chapter presents an exact previous literature review about the toxicity of two groups of NMs such as (carbon based and metal/metal oxide) in plant as well as the effect of ENMs on the toxicity of environmental pollutants.