A new vegetation heavy metal pollution index for detecting the pollution degree of different varieties of maize under copper stress

ABSTRACT

This study proposed a new vegetation heavy metal pollution index VHMPI to detect the pollution degree of different varieties of maize under copper stress, which provides a new idea for the detection of heavy metal pollution in vegetation. In order to ensure the outdoor growth environment of maize, we put all maize into outdoor greenhouse. The spectral reflectance interval of 450 nm–850 nm of maize leaves was processed by the first order differential (D) and continuum removal (CR), and the DCR spectral curve was obtained. The Pearson correlation coefficient (R) was used to analyze the DCR data and the biochemical data and select characteristic bands that sensitive to heavy metal Cu. The calculated Pearson correlation coefficients suggested that the DCR value at 490 nm–520 nm and 680 nm–700 nm presented a linear positive correlation close to 1 with the Cu²⁺ contents in soil and leaves, and a linear negative correlation close to −1 was present in the range of 630 nm–650 nm and 710 nm–750 nm. We selected the DCR value of wavelengths 505 nm, 640 nm, 690 nm and 730 nm to establish VHMPI, and compared it with conventional vegetation indices (VIs) by calculating Pearson correlation coefficient between them and Cu contents in soil and leaves, Vegetation indices include WBI (Water Band Index), PSNDa (Pigment Specific Normalized Difference a), PRI (Photochemical Reflectance Index), NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index). Maize leaf spectral data obtained from experiments in 2017 were used for verification, VHMPI was also compared with WBI, PSNDa, PRI and NDVI.The results suggested that VHMPI showed a significant correlation with Cu²⁺ stress concentration,and the correlation of VHMPI was much stronger than that of other vegetation indices. The proposed VHMPI detects the pollution degree of maize with different varieties and in different periods under copper stress has advantages of straightforward calculation, robustness, and high effectiveness. This study focused on the laboratory leaf scale, so it is expected that future work extends it to a wide range of field scale and image scale.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by The State Key Laboratory of Coal Resources and Safe Mining 2017 Open Foundation(SKLCRSM17KFA09); The National Natural Science Foundation of China (41271436); The Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (2009QD02).