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Mitigation of cadmium and arsenic in rice grain by applying different silicon fertilizers in contaminated fields

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Abstract

A field experiment was established to support the hypothesis that application of different silicon (Si) fertilizers can simultaneously reduce cadmium (Cd) and arsenic (As) concentration in rice grain. The “semi-finished product of Si-potash fertilizer” treatment at the high application of 9000 kg/ha (NP+S-KSi9000) significantly reduced the As concentration in rice grain by up to 20.1 %, compared with the control. Si fertilization reduces the Cd concentration in rice considerably more than the As concentration. All Si fertilizers apart from sodium metasilicate (Na2SiO3) exhibited a high ability to reduce Cd concentration in rice grain. The Si-calcium (CaSi) fertilizer is the most effective in the mitigation of Cd concentration in rice grain. The CaSi fertilizer applied at 9000 kg/ha (NPK+CaSi9000) and 900 kg/ha (NPK+CaSi900) reduced the Cd concentration in rice grain about 71.5 and 48.0 %, respectively, while the Si-potash fertilizer at 900 kg/ha (NP+KSi900), the semi-finished product of Si-potash fertilizer at both 900 kg/ha (NP+S-KSi900) and 9000 kg/ha (NP+S-KSi9000), and the rice straw (NPK+RS) treatments reduced the Cd concentration in rice grain about 42, 26.5, 40.7, and 23.1 %, respectively. The results of this investigation demonstrated the potential effects of Si fertilizers in reducing Cd and As concentrations in rice grain.

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Acknowledgments

This project was financially supported by the Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41371459), the State Key Program of Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 41330853), the Special Fund for Agro-scientific Research in the Public Interest of China (201503122), and the National High Technology Research and Development Program of China (863 Program, 2013AA06A209).

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    Authors and Affiliations

    1. School of Earth Sciences and Resources, China University of Geosciences, Beijing, 100083, China

      Hong-Yan Wang & Kuang Cen

    2. State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100085, China

      Hong-Yan Wang, Peng Chen & Guo-Xin Sun

    3. National Engineering Laboratory for Improving Quality of Arable Land, Institute of Agricultural Resources and Regional Planning, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, 100081, China

      Shi-Lin Wen & Lu Zhang

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    1. Hong-Yan Wang
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    Correspondence to Guo-Xin Sun.

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    Responsible editor: Elena Maestri

    Hong-Yan Wang and Shi-Lin Wen contributed equally to this work.

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    Wang, HY., Wen, SL., Chen, P. et al. Mitigation of cadmium and arsenic in rice grain by applying different silicon fertilizers in contaminated fields. Environ Sci Pollut Res 23, 3781–3788 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-015-5638-5

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