Phytoremediation of heavy metals - Applications and experiences in Croatia

Phytoremediation is defined as the effective use of plants to remove, detoxify or immobilize contaminants in the area of growth (soil, water, sediment) through biological, chemical or physical processes naturally occurring in plants. It involves growing plants in a contaminated medium, over a certain period of growth, in order to remove contaminants from the medium, or to facilitate the immobilization (binding/stopping) or degradation (detoxification) of contaminants. The biggest problem are inorganic contaminants, as opposed to organic, they are not biodegradable to less or nontoxic compounds. The main representatives of inorganic contaminants are heavy metals which pollute soils and introduce hazardous effects to the environment and to animal and human health. A large number of researches indicates that plants have a huge genetic potential that allows the removal of toxic metals from the soil, so they may play a major role in the process of phytoremediation. A research has been carried out in Croatia in this regard, related to which kind of plants are best suited to facilitate the process of phytoremediation and results showed that poplar (Populus sp.) had the highest tolerance to heavy metals and highest prospect for successful application in phytoremediation.