Year: 2018, Issue: December
Impact of leachate chemicals of red mud waste of alumina industry on the toxicity studies, seed biological studies of a crop plant.
Author:
Swarnalata Patnaik, A. Leelaveni and A. K. Panigrahi
Keyword:
Red mud waste, RM waste leachate, Toxicity, Seed germination, Seedling establishment, Temperature stress.
The leached chemicals of the red mud pond at Damonjodi pollutes the surrounding environment, particularly the crop fields, where green gram is cultivated as a second crop of the year after either rice or ragi. The lethal concentration values deduced were MAC=0.2%; LC10 -1.25% and LC50 -2% leachate concentration. Hundred percent 10 50 mortality or LC100 was found to be 2.8% leachate concentration. Experiments were conducted to find out the percent- 100 age of seed germination, seedling establishment at different lethal concentrations of the leachate. Significant depletion in shoot and root length, fresh and dry weight, chlorophyll, phaeophytin, carotene pigments and its ratio values in red mud waste leachate exposed seedlings showed much variation when compared to control values. At very low concentrations the chemicals as singular unit or as a complex unit might trigger higher rate of photosynthesis or higher values of chlorophyll content. But this can not be attributable to either stimulatory effect or regulatory effect of the toxicant. Little increment of chlorophyll pigment at lower concentration of the leachate can be attributed to the triggering affect but not stimulatory affect of the toxicant. All care should be taken to dispose the wastes of the industry in the mega environment, where complex interaction patterns are not well known and well understood.