Biosolid compost with wood shavings and yard trimmings alleviates stress and improves grain quality in soybean grown in lead polluted soils.

Heavy metals induce stress in plants, thereby affecting growth, crop quality, and food security. Most studies addressing the mitigation of these effects by soil amendment have focused on metals in soils and plant uptake, with there still being a great deal of uncertainty about how amendment application in polluted soils can modify plant stress response and, consequently, yield and food safety. Thus, the aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of biosolid compost amendment on stress response, growth, and lead accumulation in Glycine max, when applied to lead polluted agricultural soils.

Availability of lead in agricultural soils amended with compost of biosolid with wood shavings and yard trimmings.

Lead-polluted agricultural soils are a serious problem for food safety, with organic amendment being a promising mitigation method from the environmental perspective. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to evaluate lead availability and the effectiveness of the application of compost of biosolid with wood shavings and yard trimmings in contaminated soils. The physicochemical (Pb distribution, organic matter, pH, electric conductivity, cation exchange capacity, nitrogen, phosphorus, carbon, carbonates, exchangeable cations, sodium) and biological parameters (the microbial activity obtained by fluorescein diacetate hydrolysis) in Pb-polluted and non-polluted agricultural soils were evaluated after the addition of biosolid with wood shavings and yard trimming compost.

Circannual rhythms of acetylcholinesterase (AChE) activity in the freshwater fish Cnesterodon decemmaculatus.

The use of biomarkers as a tool to assess responses of organisms exposed to pollutants in toxicity bioassays, as well as in aquatic environmental risk assessment protocols, requires the understanding of the natural fluctuation of the particular biomarker. The aim of this study was to characterize the intrinsic variations of acetylcholinesterase (AChE) activity in tissues of a native freshwater teleost fish to be used as biomarker in toxicity tests, taking into account both seasonal influence and fish size. Specific AChE activity was measured by the method of Ellman et al.

Glyphosate as an acetylcholinesterase inhibitor in Cnesterodon decemmaculatus.

The toxic effect of sublethal concentrations (1, 17.5 and 35 mg L(-1)) of pure glyphosate was evaluated on acetylcholinesterase (AChE) activity in the fish species, Cnesterodon decemmaculatus. Acute bioassays (96 h) under laboratory conditions were conducted and homogenates for each specimen corresponding to the anterior, middle and posterior body sections were performed.