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Biochar Improves the Growth Performance of Maize Seedling in Response to Antimony Stress

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Abstract

Antimony (Sb) contamination has become an increasing environmental concern. A pot experiment was conducted to investigate the effects of biochar application on the maize seedling grown in Sb-contaminated soil. Two Sb levels (0, 200 mg kg−1) and three biochar rates (0, 1%, 4%) were included, giving a combination of six treatments. The results showed that exposure to Sb without biochar application (Sb2BC0) induced undesirable effects on maize seedlings, such as the inhibited growth of leaves, stems, and roots; the disorder of antioxidant system; and the reduced uptake of nutrients. Compared with Sb2BC0, biochar application to Sb-treated plants alleviated the negative effects of Sb, possibly due to the following findings: (1) the enhanced activities of SOD, POD, and CAT and the increased leaf chlorophyll content while accompanied with the reduced MDA content; (2) the increased N, P, and K content in both shoot and root; (3) the decreased shoot Sb accumulation due to the reduced translocation efficiency from root to shoot. In contrast, biochar application to nil Sb-treated soil had no significant effect on maize growth. Biochar application also immobilized soil Sb by transforming the relatively available fractions to geochemically more stable Fe and Al oxides bound fractions. These results indicated great potential of using biochar to reduce soil Sb availability for Sb-contaminated soil.

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Funding

This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31572202) and Anhui Province Key Laboratory of Plant Resource and Biology Project (ZYZWSW2014010).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Resources and Environment, Huazhong Agricultural University, No.1 Shizishan Street, Wuhan, 430070, People’s Republic of China

    Pengfei Zhu & Hongqing Hu

  2. College of Life Sciences, Huaibei Normal University, Anhui Key Laboratory of Resource and Plant Biology, No.100 Dongshan Road, Huaibei, 235000, People’s Republic of China

    Pengfei Zhu, Jirong Zhu, Wenwen Xu, Liangzuo Shu, Yang Wu & Cenpeng Tang

  3. The UWA Institute of Agriculture and School of Agriculture and Environment, The University of Western Australia, Crawley, Perth, WA, 6009, Australia

    Jiayin Pang

  4. Zhejiang Provincial Key Laboratory of Plant Evolutionary and Conservation, School of Life Science, Taizhou University, No.1139 Shifu Road, Taizhou, 318000, People’s Republic of China

    Liangzuo Shu

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  1. Pengfei Zhu
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Correspondence to Liangzuo Shu or Hongqing Hu.

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Zhu, P., Zhu, J., Pang, J. et al. Biochar Improves the Growth Performance of Maize Seedling in Response to Antimony Stress. Water Air Soil Pollut 231, 154 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11270-020-04521-1

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