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Implementation of Microalgae 4.0 in Environmental Biotechnology
Published in Pau Loke Show, Wai Siong Chai, Tau Chuan Ling, Microalgae for Environmental Biotechnology, 2023
Akshara Ann Varghese, Doris Ying Ying Tang, Sze Shin Low, Pau Loke Show
Environmental toxicants are defined as toxic materials that are present in the environment and can affect a wide range of ecosystems, like water bodies, land, or even air. The examples of environmental toxicants are industrial waste, household waste, heavy metals, and agricultural waste (Rossignol, Genuis, and Frye 2014) that are mostly found in aquatic ecosystems. Therefore, there is a need to implement the indicators to provide the data on the severity of the pollution and assess the toxicity of the contaminants that are present in the environment. One of the indicators used to monitor the environment are bioindicators using microorganisms, such as bacteria, fungi, and microalgae. The benefits of using the biomonitors are the determination of biological impacts, demonstration of potential synergistic and antagonistic effects of various contaminants on the ecosystems, monitoring of the effects of toxicants on the human and animal health as well as cost-effectiveness (Parmar, Rawtani, and Agrawal 2016).
Bioindication and Bioremediation of Mining Degraded Soil
Published in Vivek Kumar, Rhizomicrobiome Dynamics in Bioremediation, 2021
Danica Fazekašová, Juraj Fazekaš
Soil quality indicators currently used are mainly based on chemical and physical parameters. Numerous critical ‘threshold’ levels are accepted nationally for chemical factors. In general, chemical and physical indicators require long periods if the effects on humans or management practices are to be identified. In contrast, soil biota reacts in a sensitive way to changes and therefore biological indicators are suitable for early diagnosis of degradation processes (Abdu et al. 2017, Havlicek 2012). There are two concepts: bioindicators and biomonitoring. Bioindicators are organisms or communities of organisms that provide information about the quality of the environment. Biomonitoring is a regular, systematic use of sensitive organisms to monitor the quality of the environment; it stores quantitative information on the quality of the environment (Havlicek 2012).
Molluscs as a Tool for River Health Assessment: A Case Study of River Ganga at Varanasi
Published in Ajai Singh, Wastewater Reuse and Watershed Management, 2019
Rivers in the current scenario are under permanent pressure of various forms of pollution causing anthropogenic activities. River ecosystems act as a sink for various kinds of toxicants emerging from different sources of pollution (Salánki et al., 2003). These toxic pollutants are severely degrading the health of the rivers (Cairns et al., 1993). Riverine biodiversity act as an indicator of the health of the river system (Boulton, 1999). Altered flow regimes and pollution are adversely affecting the biotic makeup of the river (Bunn and Arthington, 2002; Strayer and Dudgeon, 2010). Evaluating biotic components using bioindicator can reveal the real scenario of river health (Nandi et al., 2016). A bioindicator is an organism (or a part or community of an organism) that provides information about the quality of environment making changes in the morphological, histological or cellular structures, their metabolic processes, their population structure or in their behavioral pattern (Markert et al., 2003). Bioindicator response to the aquatic pollutants in two ways, i.e., either by accumulating the pollutants or by showing visible specific changes in the characteristics or population structure (Markert et al., 2003). Bioindicator are selected for pollution monitoring based on certain specific characteristics (Füreder and Reynolds, 2003) which includes: (1) clear taxonomy; (2) wide distribution; (3) occurrence in large numbers with appropriate visible body size; (4) restricted mobility; (5) site specificity; (6) narrow specific ecological demands and tolerance; (7) clear feeding structure; (8) long lifespan and generation time; (9) sensitivity to specific pollutants; (10) low genetic and ecological variability; (11) response to specific pollutant/substance should be representative to other taxas or even ecosystem; and (12) easy to sample, store, recognition, and robust during handling.
Sentinel species for biomonitoring and biosurveillance of environmental heavy metals in Nigeria
Published in Journal of Environmental Science and Health, Part C, 2022
Cecilia Nwadiuto Amadi, Chiara Frazzoli, Orish Ebere Orisakwe
Biomonitoring can be classified into passive and active types. Passive biomonitoring involves the use of organisms, and components of organisms that are a natural part of the ecosystem and exist on their own accord. Active biomonitoring involves a well-calculated and deliberate methods that place organisms (under controlled conditions) into the ecosystem to be monitored or probed.185 Bioindicators are plants, animals and microorganisms that can be used to evaluate the health status of the environment and the estimation of the exposure of other living organisms, including humans.157,161,186,187 They constitute an embodiment of tools for detecting both positive and negative variations in the environment.13 Animals are important indicators of environmental hazards which can provide early warning mechanisms for public health intervention.161 Animals are exposed to environmental contaminants of natural and man-made origin, and hence are appropriate bioindicators of environmental pollution.134,169
Ficus retusa L. as possible indicator of air metallic pollution in urban environment
Published in International Journal of Phytoremediation, 2022
Leila Sahli, Hadjer Belhiouani
Of the numerous air pollutants, HMs have received great attention because of their non‐biodegradable, and persistent nature, as well as toxic and disruptive effects on living organisms even at low concentrations (Gholizadeh et al.2019). Over the past decades, the use of plants for HMs pollution monitoring has drawn considerable attention of scientists’ worldwide (Safari et al.2018; Birke et al.2018; Mukherjee et al.2016; Serbula et al.2013; Fowler et al.2009). The use of plants as a passive sampler in biomonitoring has the advantage of high spatial and temporal distribution and a low sampling cost (Sawidis et al.2011). Due to their exclusive dependence on the air, lichens and mosses are considered to be the best bioindicators; they are in the forefront of researches (Berdonces et al.2017). However, in highly contaminated environments, particularly in urban areas where anthropogenic pressure is high, we often see the scarcity or even the total disappearance of these organisms (Pacheco et al.2002). Thus, higher plants that persist can be used for air quality biomonitoring (Mukherjee et al.2016; Alahabadi et al.2017; Safari et al.2018). Nowadays, trees are the most commonly used as bioindicators in air quality biomonitoring studies, as they do not change their position within the landscape, some species are evergreen, and subject to pollutants permanently, they are long-lived organisms that can reflect the effects of chronic exposure to metals, offer a great availability of the biological material, and are usually easier to identify as compared to other organisms such as fungi, algae, lichens, or mosses (Geras’kin et al.2011; Kandziora-Ciupa et al.2016; Alahabadi et al.2017).
Moss biomonitoring of air pollution with potentially toxic elements in the Kumanovo Region, North Macedonia
Published in Journal of Environmental Science and Health, Part A, 2022
Trajče Stafilov, Robert Šajn, Suzana Veličkovski-Simonović, Claudiu Tănăselia
Bioindicators include biological processes, species, or communities used to assess the quality of the environment and how it changes over time.[8] Changes in the environment are often attributed to anthropogenic influences. The widespread development and application of bioindicators have occurred primarily since the 1960s.[9] Bioindicators qualitatively assess biotic responses to environmental stress, while biomonitors quantitatively determine a response.[10] Mosses have been frequently used to monitor time-integrated bulk deposition of metals as a combination of wet, cloud, and dry deposition, thus eliminating some of the complications of precipitation analysis due to the heterogeneity of precipitation.[9,11] Because mosses have a high cation exchange capacity (CEC), they act as hyper-accumulators of metals and metal complexes. The metals are bound to the tissue with minimal translocation within the plant due to a lack of vascular tissue.[9] This results in biological tissue that can be analyzed to reveal time-integrated deposition.[12] Additional advantages of using mosses as heavy metal biomonitors include their stationary nature, widespread geographic distribution, and low genetic variability between populations. It has been shown, that there is some experimental error due to heterogeneity in morphological characteristics and microenvironments among different populations.[12] Thus, mosses offer an efficient, low-cost complement for determining metal concentrations at a large number of locations and offer analyses of biologically relevant fluxes at multiple scales.