Soudek P., Petrová Š., Benešová D., Dvořáková M., Vaněk T.
JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL RADIOACTIVITY 102 [6]: 598-604, 2011

Keywords: uranium, uptake, Sinapis alba, Brassica oleracea, Armoracia rusticana, germination test
Abstract: Hydroponicaly cultivated plants were grown on medium containing uranium. The appropriate concentrations of uranium for the experiments were selected on the base of standard ecotoxicity test. The most sensitive plant species was determined to be Lactuca sativa with an EC50 value about 0.1 mM. Cucumis sativa represented the most resistant plant to uranium presence (EC50 = 0.71 mM). Therefore, we used the uranium in a concentration range from 0.1 to 1 mM. Twenty different plant species were tested in hydroponic solution supplemented by 0.1 mM or 0.5 mM uranium concentration. The uranium accumulation of these plants varied from 0.16 mg/g DW to 0.011 mg/g DW. The highest uranium uptake was determined for Zea mays and the lowest for Arabidopsis thaliana. The amount of accumulated uranium was strongly influenced by uranium concentration in the cultivation medium. Autoradiography showed that uranium is mainly localized in the root system of the plants tested. Additional experiments demonstrated the possibility of influencing the uranium uptake from the cultivation medium by amendments. Tartaric acid was able to increase uranium uptake by Brassica oleracea and Sinapis alba up to 2.8 times or 1.9 times, respectively. Phosphate deficiency increased uranium uptake up to 4.5 times or 3.9 times, respectively, by Brassica oleracea and Sinapis alba. In the case of deficiency of iron or presence of cadmium ions we did not find any increase in uranium accumulation.
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IEB authors: Marcela Dvořáková, Šárka Petrová, Petr Soudek, Tomáš Vaněk