干旱区生态环境知识资源中心

Lead (Pb) has great toxicity to human beings and other livings. Although there are varied ways to rehabilitate the Pb contaminated area, phytoremediation of Pb pollution in arid lands is still a difficult task, it is therefore urgent to find and identify Pb tolerant plants in arid areas. The physiological responses and tolerance mechanisms to Pb stress (expressed as the Pb concentration, e.g., 0, 50, 150, 300, 600, 800, 1000 mg/L) were investigated for the xerophils Salsola passerine Bunge and Chenopodium album L Results indicated that S. passerine exhibited higher Pb tolerance than Ch. album in terms of the seed germination rate, bio-activities of SOD and POD, and lower MDA production. There were two ways for S. passerina to reduce Pb toxicity in organism level, e.g., cell wall precipitation and state transfer of free Pb into anchorage. These findings demonstrate that S. passerine is a Pb tolerant species and may have potential application in phytoremediation of Pb contaminated arid lands. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.