Heavy metal contamination in vegetables by flash torch & battery manufacturing industry

Abstract

Pollution   of  the   biosphere with  heavy   metal  has   accelerated  dramatically  during the  last  century,  Unlike organic  pollutants  heavy   metal   are   persistant  environmental  contaminant, which   can  not  be  chemically  or biologically destroyed.  In  low  concentration, several  heavy  metals such   as  Fe, Mn,  Zn,  Cu,Ni  and   Mo  are essential  micronutrients  for   plants.  Elevated  concentration  of  heavy  metals  in  the   soil  surface cause   a variety of  environmental  problems,  including toxicity to  plants,  animal and   humans. The  objective of  this study  was  to  evaluate  the  level  of  heavy   metal  contamination in  a  field  irrigated with   flash   torch & battery manufacturing  industry effluent  and   accumulation, distribution  of  heavy   metals in  vegetables  grown in contaminated  fields  .An  attempt has  also  been  made to  evaluate the   exposure risk of heavy  metals to  human beings.  Cabbage were found  to   have  translocation  index  more  than   100 i.e  103.06  for  Fe,  While  Cauliflower has  translocation  index   110.77 for Cu.  These plant   species   can   be  suggested,  as  hyper  accumulator species for   Fe  and   Cu,   but   these   plant   species are  edible plant  hence   can   not   be  suggested  to  grow   on  metal contaminated  site.  The   exposure risk  levels  of  the  exposed population groups to  heavy   metals, it is  quite clear  from the  results that  except Cu  (1.08)  none  of  the  metal   were  found to  exceed the  RO  value   more than 1.0.While  in  case  of  Fe  the  RQ  value  were found 0.935  which is  nearer to  1.0,