fairfolio
Saved Projects

Heavy Metals Alter Plant Physiology and Development

CSEF · 2023 Plant Biology Honorable_mention Award

Munshi Sahel · 8

Overview

Heavy metals are naturally occurring elements that have widely contributed to pollution in many forms. Due to multiple industrial, domestic, agricultural, medical and technological applications, they have been widely distributed in the environment which has raised concerns over their effects on the ecosystem. Their toxicity depends on several factors including the dose, route of exposure, and chemical species. In this experiment, the effects of copper, molybdenum, and arsenic on plant development were tested and compared. While all three elements showed some form of growth interference, the effects on the root and shoot development varied. The plants treated with copper had inhibited root growth corresponding with the concentration. However, the shoot growth was not as affected. The lowest concentration of molybdenum had no effect on root development, but the higher concentrations prevented both root branching and lengthening. All concentrations of arsenic showed slowing of root growth, but the shoot growth was not so drastically affected. This study demonstrated that plant have at least some level of tolerance when exposed to external stresses such as heavy metals. As such, it could have an interesting application in the decorative or ornamental plant industry. When treated with heavy metals, it was found that while the shoot length of the plant was altered, the appearance in terms of color and leafing were not changed. Using precise concentrations of heavy metals could be an innovative method to cultivate bonsais.

Source coverage

This record comes from a published award list, not a complete project archive. Its abstract comes from CSEF's public project showcase as archived by the Internet Archive before judging (https://web.archive.org/web/20230401224130/https://ca-csef.zfairs.com/showcase/ShowcaseInfo?f=838e60b7-ea75-46e8-865c-fde4864244b3); the version presented may differ.

Awards (1)

  • Category Award: HM

Competition history

  • CSEF 2023 Plant Biology · Entry J1830

Resources

Related projects

Closest projects by meaning, across every fair and year in the corpus.

Browse more like this

Source: California Science & Engineering Fair public projects

Save projects to your library

Sign in with Google to keep track of projects you find interesting, organized into folders. An account also raises your daily allowance for “Has this been done?”, and lets you create a key for the MCP server with a much higher limit than anonymous use. Browsing stays public.

Continue with Google