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Predicting copper phytotoxicity based on pore-water pCu

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Abstract

The free ion activity and “biotic ligand” models predict that the free metal ion and other pore-water parameters describe terrestrial phytotoxicity. In this study, pore-water chemistry and measured Cu2+ was used to describe phytotoxicity of cucumber (Cucumis sativa L) in 10 contrasting soils at different soil Cu loadings. Both soil solution Cu (Cupw) and Cu2+ successfully described the response variable for all ten soils with R2 values of 0.73 and 0.66, respectively. Separation of soils as acid and alkaline and fitting separately showed that there was a strongly significant fit for both log Cu2+ and log Cupw in acidic soils (R2 = 0.92 and 0.86, respectively) but weakly significant fit for alkaline soils. The pCu EC50 and EC10 values in all acidic soils for cucumber were 5.83 (6.03–5.63) and 7.53 (8.27–7.00), respectively. In our dataset alkaline soils need to be treated individually. In addition, pCu could be predicted based on pH and total concentration alone. Despite only 12 weeks ‘ageing’ there was quantitative agreement between pCu model from this study and predicted pCu from Sauvé et al. This agreement from studies performed independently indicates that, at least in the case of Cu2+, the difference in an ageing period of ≥10 years appears minimal.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank Mr Rayhan Mahbub, Mr. Ramkrishna Nirola and Ms. Sedigheh Abbasi for their valuable assistance in soil sampling and Mr Dylan Lamb for assistance in pore-water analysis. This research was funded through Cooperative Research Centre for Contamination Assessment and Remediation of the Environment (CRC CARE Pty Ltd).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Global Centre for Environmental Research (GCER), Faculty of Science and Information Technology, The University of Newcastle, Advanced Technology Building, Callaghan, NSW, 2308, Australia

    Mohammed Kader, Dane T. Lamb, Liang Wang, Mallavarapu Megharaj & Ravi Naidu

  2. Cooperative Research Centre for Contamination Assessment and Remediation of the Environment (CRC CARE), University of South Australia, Bld X, Mawson Lakes, SA, 5095, Australia

    Mohammed Kader, Dane T. Lamb, Liang Wang, Mallavarapu Megharaj & Ravi Naidu

  3. Centre for Environmental Risk Assessment and Remediation, University of South Australia, Building X, Mawson Lakes, SA, 5095, Australia

    Mohammed Kader

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  1. Mohammed Kader
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Correspondence to Dane T. Lamb.

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Kader, M., Lamb, D.T., Wang, L. et al. Predicting copper phytotoxicity based on pore-water pCu. Ecotoxicology 25, 481–490 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10646-015-1605-7

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