Increasing knowledge about phytoremediation through a practical approach for undergraduate students

ABSTRACT

Universities play an important role in society and in providing solutions for its problems. Environmental pollution is one of the most serious problems facing the world today. Thus, universities are increasingly including subjects related to the environment and its conservation both in their educational and research programmes. Generally, undergraduate students know many benefits of plants, such as being sources for food and several bioactive compounds, provision of atmospheric oxygen and soil conservation. However, they are less aware of the potential of plants in ‘cleaning’ environmental pollutants. To this end, a useful biochemistry laboratory approach is described that guides students to learn about the applicability of phytoremediation using in vitro plant cultures (hairy roots) to degrade an organic pollutant (phenol) from a synthetic solution. This laboratory approach has been successfully implemented in university Plant Biotechnology courses to deepen understanding about phytoremediation potential and highlight the biochemical basis of this process. This procedure can be easily adopted to increase student learning of environmental issues, and awareness about the potential of using plants for environmental remediation processes.

KEYWORDS:

• Phytoremediation
• phenol
• peroxidases
• practical approach
• undergraduate students

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by grants from Secretaría de Ciencia y Técnica- Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto (SECyT-UNRC) (PIIMEG 2013-2014), Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET) (PIP). MV was supported by a fellowship from CONICET. ALWO, SGI, LGSA, MAT and EA are members of the Research Career from CONICET (Argentina). Authors wish to thank all the undergraduate students who through their participation in the Plant Biotechnology course contributed and made possible this work.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Secretaría de Ciencia y Técnica, Universidad Nacional de Río Cuarto [PIIMEG 2013-2014].