Phytoremediation is a plant based pollutant-removal system. Read on to see how Phytoremediation works.
…Genetically modified poplar trees in Ms. Doty’s lab sucked 91 per cent of the toxin trichloroethylene from a liquid solution. Natural plants were able to remove only 3 per cent of the toxin, the most common ground-water contaminant in the United States.
The genetically modified plants in the study were grown in vials and were just several centimetres tall. But these tiny plants were able to metabolize the pollutant into harmless byproducts 100 times faster than the natural plants.
Researchers at the University of York, meanwhile, devised genetically modified plants using genes from microbes that can degrade the explosive RDX, a potential cancer-causing agent.To test their system, they introduced genes into Arabidopsis plants – the plant equivalent of lab rats.
Researchers Rosamond Jackson, Neil Bruce and colleagues found that the modified plants removed RDX from contaminated liquids and soil far faster than unaltered plants….
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