6th ISF

ENVI011 - Research on the industry's impact on the environment using Phytoindication

Nowadays, environmental pollution in cities is a big problem. The main causes of pollution are industrial emissions and car exhausts. It means that knowing indicators, which shows the deterioration of ecological status is quite relevant. Plants are very sensitive to the impacts of harmful substances and they react quite quickly even to low concentrations of pollution. Coniferous trees are convenient bioindicators because they can accumulate harmful substances from the atmosphere for a long time. As the object of our project, we have chosen a Pinus sylvestris L. which is quite common in our region. We believe that there is an inverse relationship between the biochemical and morphological integrity of pine needles and the contamination of the place where the pine grows. For our research, we took samples from three locations: an industrial zone (not far from the city), a city and a forest (on the opposite side of the industrial zone). The morphological characteristics of the needles as the evidence of physiological disturbances leading to clatter and necrosis were studied. Analysis of data from the area near the plant showed more significant necrosis and chlorosis comparatively to the city and the forest. This demonstrates the high level of air pollution in the industrial zone. Biochemical analysis of the state of the antioxidant system of plants was also used in our project, because it is an important indicator of plant tissues protection from the negative effect of the environment. We measured the content of ascorbic acid in the samples of needles taken from each location. The concentration of ascorbic acid in conifers from the industrial zone is reduced, compared to other two zones. Our results show the effectiveness of using Pinus sylvestris L. for further environmental monitoring both in our city and in other territories.

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