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Effect of chemical fertilizers on the fractionation of Cu, Cr and Ni in contaminated soil

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Environmental Geology

Abstract

Effect of chemical fertilizers (urea, NH4Cl, Ca(NO3)2, KCl and KH2PO4) on the fractionation of Cu, Cr and Ni was studied by a 4-month incubation experiment. Using sequential extraction procedure, it was found that the application of fertilizers could change the distribution of Cu, Cr and Ni in the fractions of soil. Applying urea (CO(NH2)2) significantly decreased the concentrations of Cu, Cr and Ni in water soluble plus exchangeable (WE) fraction, but increased those in Fe–Mn oxides bound (FM) fraction (p < 0.01). However, application of NH4Cl caused an increase in the WE fraction by 27.7% for Cu, 111.5% for Cr and 20.4% for Ni. The CO(NH2)2 raised the soil pH from 4.51 to 4.96, whereas NH4Cl lowered the pH of soil by 0.44 units. The WE fraction of the three heavy metals was significantly increased, while the FM fraction was significantly decreased by adding KCl (p < 0.01). Moreover, the supply of KH2PO4 reduced the WE and carbonate bound (CB) fractions of Cu, Cr and Ni in the soil, however, it raised Cu and Ni in the residual (RS) fraction and Cr in the FM fraction. In addition, the mobility index indicated that KCl and NH4Cl increased the mobility of Cu, Cr and Ni in the soil, whereas urea and KH2PO4 decreased the mobility of the three metals in the soil. These results suggest that applying chemical fertilizers does not only provide plant nutrients, but may also change the speciation and mobility of heavy metals in the soil.

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Acknowledgments

This work was cosponsored by the Ministry of Education of China (JiaoKeShi 2006-51), the Provincial Education Department of Guangxi (GuiJiaoRen 2004-29), the Provincial Personnel Department of Guangxi (No.2004217) and Natural Science Foundation of Guangxi, China (No.0542006, 0342001-4). The authors wish to thank Mr Liang Yan-peng for his help in AAS analysis. An anonymous reviewer is thanked for a cogent review of the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Life Sciences, Yunnan University, Kunming, 650091, People’s Republic of China

    Jie Liu & Chang-Qun Duan

  2. Department of Resources and Environmental Engineering, Guilin University of Technology, Guilin, 541004, People’s Republic of China

    Jie Liu, Yi-Nian Zhu, Xue-Hong Zhang & Cheng-Xian Wang

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  1. Jie Liu
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  2. Chang-Qun Duan
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  3. Yi-Nian Zhu
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Correspondence to Jie Liu or Yi-Nian Zhu.

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Liu, J., Duan, CQ., Zhu, YN. et al. Effect of chemical fertilizers on the fractionation of Cu, Cr and Ni in contaminated soil. Environ Geol 52, 1601–1606 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-006-0604-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-006-0604-7

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