DOI: 10.22620/agrisci.2010.03.004
Abstract
The sensitivity of two plant test systems for evaluation of metal phytotoxicity was compared. The two tests are differentiated by the used model plants and indicators. The first test was developed by making use of bean plants and the second one made use of cucumber plants. The changes in the activity of selected enzymes represent the basic functional indicators in the bean test, whereas the cucumber test is based on photosynthetic parameters. Both tests were applied towards the evaluation of the relative phytotoxicity of complexly contaminated by Cd, Zn and Cu substrates. It was established that the cucumber test had higher sensitivity to metal toxicity compared to the bean test as it identified higher toxicity of the analyzed substrates. In addition, one of its strong advantages is the speed of measurements of nondestructive photosynthetic parameters – CO2 assimilation rate and apparent photosynthetic transport rate.