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New Jersey Northern Reducing Per -and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS) Water Contamination With Mycorrhizal Hydroponics Plants

JSHS · 2024

Neel Ahuja, Mr. Christopher Cook · Millburn High School, Millburn, NJ

Overview

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), known as “forever chemicals,” have carcinogenic effects and cause the deaths of 382,000 Americans every year. Over 600,000 military personnel are annually served water with unsafe levels of PFAS due to contaminat ion by aqueous film forming foam (AFFF), a PFAS - containing firefighting foam used by the military. Current methods to purify PFAS -contaminated water can cost millions of dollars and require existing infrastructure, making them difficult to implement in low er- income and rural areas without industrial treatment plants. Hydroponics plants colonized by beneficial mycorrhizal fungi present an affordable and sustainable solution to purifying PFAS -contaminated water, particularly at government stormwater detention ponds. In this study, mycorrhizal -inoculated basil and lettuce plants were cultivated in deep water culture (DWC) systems under controlled conditions. PFAS was added to the systems and an LC/QQQ -MS instrument was used to measure PFAS concentrations in samples taken over 72 hours. Results showed that mycorrhizal plants removed 71.1% of PFAS in a water system compared to 59.9% by non -mycorrhizal plants, and t-test (p=0.05) was used to prove statistical significance. Further analysis revealed a direct relationship between plant root-length and PFAS purification as well as phytoremediation being successfully modeled by second-order kinetics. No significant difference was observed between uptake of short -chain and long -chain PFAS, indicating another advantage of phytoremediation over traditional filtration systems. This study provided a proof -of-concept of the effectiveness of mycorrhizal hydroponics plants in reducing PFAS contamination in water systems, presenting applications as an inexpensive and large-scale purification system.

Competition history

  • JSHS 2024 Category not listed

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