Search results for " Heavy metal"
showing 10 items of 58 documents
Eco-Friendly Estimation of Heavy Metal Contents in Grapevine Foliage Using In-Field Hyperspectral Data and Multivariate Analysis
2019
Heavy metal monitoring in food-producing ecosystems can play an important role in human health safety. Since they are able to interfere with plants’ physiochemical characteristics, which influence the optical properties of leaves, they can be measured by in-field spectroscopy. In this study, the predictive power of spectroscopic data is examined. Five treatments of heavy metal stress (Cu, Zn, Pb, Cr, and Cd) were applied to grapevine seedlings and hyperspectral data (350−2500 nm), and heavy metal contents were collected based on in-field and laboratory experiments. The partial least squares (PLS) method was used as a feature selection technique, and multiple linear regressions (…
Experimental and robust modeling approach for lead(II) uptake by alginate gel beads: influence of the ionic strength and medium composition.
2014
Abstract Systematic kinetic and equilibrium studies on the lead ions removal ability by Ca-alginate gel beads have been performed by varying several internal parameters, namely, number of gel beads, nature and composition of the ionic medium and pH, which allowed us to model a wastewater in order to closely reproduce the composition of a real sample. Moreover, the effects brought about the different ionic species present in the reacting medium have been evaluated. Differential Pulse Anodic Stripping Voltammetry (DP-ASV), has been systematically used to perform kinetic and equilibrium measurements over continuous time in a wide range of concentration. Kinetic and equilibrium data have been q…
Is Active Moss Biomonitoring Comparable to Air Filter Standard Sampling?
2022
Recently, significant attention has been paid to air quality awareness and its impact on human health, especially in urban agglomerations. Many types of dust samplers for air quality monitoring are used by governmental environmental monitoring agencies. However, these techniques are associated with high costs; as a consequence, biological methods such as active moss biomonitoring are being developed. The main disadvantages of such techniques are the lack of standardization of the preparation procedures and the lack of reliable comparisons of results with data from instrumental analyses. Our study aimed to compare the results obtained from active biomonitoring with the use of three moss spec…
Electrochemical pH Control at Gold Nanowires
2018
In this work, interdigitated arrays of nanowire electrodes are used with one array acting as the working electrode while the other is used to generate the required protons. Finite element simulations of the pH control electrodes were performed to provide insight on the generation and subsequent diffusion of protons. This informed the inter-tine spacing of the electrodes used.. This electrochemical pH control method was then used to enable the detection of analytes of interest.
BIOMONITORIG ACTIVITIES OF “COMPRENSORIO DI PACE DEL MELA”.ANALYSES OF AIR QUALITY DATA
2007
The “Assessorato Territorio e Ambiente” of the Regional Sicilian Government and the “Ingegneria e Tecnologie Agro Forestali” (ITAF) Department, Palermo University, have been involved in a study (D.R.S. N° 473) concerning the occurrence of environmental pollution by heavy metals in the "Comprensorio territoriale di Pace del Mela". The involved local administrations (“comuni”) in the area of interest are: Condrò, Gualtieri Sicaminò, Milazzo, Pace del Mela, S.Filippo del Mela, Santa Lucia del Mela, San Pier Niceto. Naturalistic aspects and landscape relevance of the “Pace del Mela” area is supported by the existence of three Natural Reserves, twelve Sites of Community Interest (S.I.C.) and a Z…
Metals distribution in the organic and inorganic fractions of soil: A case study on soils from Sicily
2005
The content of Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Fe, Mn, Ni, Pb and Zn, has been determined in the organic and inorganic fraction of eight soil samples from Sicily. A modified type-Tessier sequential extraction procedure has been used to recognize metals in five different fractions categorised as follows: (a) exchangeable metals, (b) metals bound to carbonates, (c) metals bound to iron and manganese oxides, (d) metals bound to organic matter, and (e) metals in residual fraction. The mineralogical composition of soils samples was characterized by X-ray diffraction. Humic substances were extracted by means of an alkaline extraction procedure. It has been found that both the mineralogical composition and the di…
Effect of pruning-derived biochar on heavy metals removal and water dynamics
2014
Biomass-derived biochar is considered as a promising heavy metal adsorbent, due to abundance of polar functional groups, such as carboxylic, hydroxyl, and amino groups, which are available for heavy metal removal. The aims of this study were to evaluate the effectiveness of an orchard pruning-derived biochar in removing some heavy metals (through the evaluation of isotherms) and to study water dynamics at the solid-liquid interface as affected by heavy metal adsorption (through an innovative nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) relaxometry approach). Both isotherms and NMR spectra revealed that Pb and Cr showed a good affinity for the biochar surface (Pb > Cr), while Cu was less affine. Accordi…
Statistical characterisation of heavy metal contents inParacentrotus lividusfrom Mediterranean Sea
2014
This work focuses on the estimation of Hg, As, Cr, Ni, Cu, V, Cd and Pb by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry in 135 adult specimens of Paracentrotus lividus collected in different coastal areas of Sicily (Gela, Punta Secca, Ragusa (RG), Siracusa, Priolo, Catania, Messina, Milazzo, Brolo and Filicudi), in order to monitor the Mediterranean marine ecosystem by use of sea urchin as bioindicator. Moreover, the paper deals with the statistical classification of the tested samples according to the sampling area based on metal concentrations. The descriptive statistics findings were obtained and, a starting multivariate matrix was built. Data-sets were subjected to Kruskal-Wallis test t…
Coping with uncertainty in the assessment of atmospheric pollution with lichen transplants
2019
In the assessment of atmospheric deposition using lichen transplants, coping with uncertainty is mandatory in cases of environmental forensics, when understanding whether an area is polluted or not, or tracing a given pollution source is of paramount importance. In this article, we have suggested a method based on the calculation of exposed-to-control ratios of element concentrations and on the quantification of the overall uncertainty associated with such calculation, which proved to be very robust and can be applied in most cases using a minimum of three replicates. The method allowed the selection of significantly accumulated elements i.e. those polluting the site under study, as well as…
Functionalization of ultrasound enhanced sewage sludge-derived biochar: Physicochemical improvement and its effects on soil enzyme activities and hea…
2020
Abstract Poor physicochemical characteristics and high heavy metals content are main limitations of applying sludge-based biochars in remediation studies. The present study attempts to combine two practical approaches of ultrasound pre-treatment with low-time and low-frequency and chemical functionalization using citric acid. The aims of this study are enhancement physicochemical characteristics and environmental applicability of sludge-derived biochar. The characteristics of obtained ultrasound-treated functionalized biochar (UFB), sludge-derived biochar (SDB) and sewage sludge (SS) were evaluated. Then, the effects of these additives on soil heavy metals availability, soil enzyme activiti…