Transcriptional insights into Cu related tolerance strategies in maize linked to a novel tea-biochar.

Environ Pollut

School of Plant, Environment and Soil Sciences, Louisiana State University AgCenter, Baton Rouge, LA, 70803, USA.

Published: January 2022

AI Article Synopsis

  • One-third of maize cultivation in Turkey occurs in the fertile Black Sea Region, but yields are impacted by copper (Cu) toxicity from an old mine.
  • Researchers created a biochar from black tea waste to help reduce Cu levels in the soil and enhance maize growth, finding that a 5% biochar application significantly reduced Cu uptake without harming the plants.
  • The tea-derived biochar improved the plants' metabolic responses, increased water efficiency, and enhanced chlorophyll health, showcasing its potential as an effective solution for Cu contamination in agriculture.

Article Abstract

One-third of maize cultivation in Turkey has been performed in nutrient-rich soils of the coastal agricultural lands of the Black Sea Region, which is among the country's granaries. However, the yield of this chief crop is affected by Cu toxicity due to a decades-long abandoned opencast Cu-mine. As part of the modern agenda, against this problem, we valorized one of the region's signature plant waste by synthesizing a tea-derived biochar (BC) and evaluated for remediation effect on maize Cu tolerance. Among other rates (0%, 0.4%, 0.8%, 1.6%), maximum Cu absorption (168.27 mg kg) was found in the 5%BC in in-vitro spiking experiments where natural Cu contamination levels were mimicked. Obvious increasing trends in both root and shoot tissues of maize plantlets growing in Cu-spiked soil (260.26 ± 5.19 mg Cu kg) were recorded with proportionally increasing BC application rates. The black tea waste-BC (5%) amendment remarkably reduced the Cu uptake from Cu spiked-soil and showed no phenotypic retardation in maize. Accordingly, it boosted the metabolic and transcriptomic profile owing to up-regulation in the aquaporin and defense genes (PIP1;5 and POD1) by 1.31 and 1.6 fold. The tea-BC application also improved the soil-plant water relations by minimizing cytosolic volume changes between 85 and 90%, increasing chlorophyll intactness (65%) and membrane stability up to 41%. The tea-BC could be a strong agent with potential agronomic benefits in the remediation of the cationic Cu toxicity that occurred in the mining-contaminated agricultural soils.

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Source
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.envpol.2021.118500DOI Listing

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