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The Hows and Whys of Heavy Metal-Mediated Phytotoxicity: An Insight

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Cellular and Molecular Phytotoxicity of Heavy Metals

Part of the book series: Nanotechnology in the Life Sciences ((NALIS))

Abstract

For the last few years, heavy metal toxicity in plants has remained as a global concern in respect to environment, agriculture, and ultimately human health. Several anthropogenic activities including modern agriculture process and industrialization cause a sharp increase in the concentration of various heavy metals in air, soil, and water. Constant increase in heavy metal concentration in the environment causes their entry and bioaccumulation in the food chain through plants. In plants, heavy metals directly or indirectly affect a broad range of physiological and metabolic processes including inhibition of photosynthesis and respiration and decrease in essential plant pigments which ultimately affect crop productivity. Inside the root cells, heavy metal ions may accumulate within various subcellular compartments of root cells, mainly vacuole and Golgi apparatus, or may be transported to different parts of the shoot through xylem cylinder by forming complex with different metal chelators. A common consequence of heavy metal toxicity in the plant cell is the elevated accumulation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) which can hamper the structure and function of crucial biomolecules including lipid, protein, and enzymes. The interaction of heavy metals with nuclear proteins, chromatin, and microtubules results in profound mitotic abnormality and genotoxicity. Plants have developed a sophisticated and coordinated system that modulates the uptake, accumulation, relocation, and detoxification of metals by highly effective homeostatic mechanisms. Various components of this network have been identified till date, including different transporters and chelators. Transporters belonging to different classes are involved in metal uptake and vacuolar transport and chelators involved in trafficking and detoxification via buffering the cytosolic metal concentrations. This chapter considers the recent progress in understanding the mechanism of heavy metal uptake and relocation and also provides insights regarding the mechanisms governing metal phytotoxicity.

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Acknowledgement

The authors gratefully acknowledge Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, Govt. of India (Ref. No. 38(1417)/16/EMR-II, dated: 17/05/2016 to SR), and SERB, DST, Govt. of India (Ref. No. ECR/2016/000539 to SR), for providing necessary financial supports. KM and SB thank CSIR, Govt. of India, for the JRF fellowship. The authors gratefully acknowledge the contribution of Ms. Sayanti De for preparing the schematic representations of the data.

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  1. Department of Botany, UGC Center for Advanced Studies, The University of Burdwan, Golapbag Campus, Burdwan, West Bengal, India

    Kalyan Mahapatra, Samrat Banerjee & Sujit Roy

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  1. Kalyan Mahapatra
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  2. Samrat Banerjee
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  3. Sujit Roy
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  1. Department of Botany and Microbiology, College of Science, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

    Mohammad Faisal

  2. Department of Zoology, College of Science, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

    Quaiser Saquib

  3. Department of Botany and Microbiology, College of Science, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

    Abdulrahman A. Alatar

  4. Department of Zoology, College of Science, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

    Abdulaziz A. Al-Khedhairy

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Mahapatra, K., Banerjee, S., Roy, S. (2020). The Hows and Whys of Heavy Metal-Mediated Phytotoxicity: An Insight. In: Faisal, M., Saquib, Q., Alatar, A.A., Al-Khedhairy, A.A. (eds) Cellular and Molecular Phytotoxicity of Heavy Metals. Nanotechnology in the Life Sciences. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-45975-8_2

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