{"id":28580,"date":"2018-02-23T10:46:09","date_gmt":"2018-02-23T14:46:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fondriest.com\/news\/?p=28580"},"modified":"2018-02-21T10:55:02","modified_gmt":"2018-02-21T14:55:02","slug":"common-cord-moss-uncommonly-adept-lead-removal-researchers-find","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fondriest.com\/news\/common-cord-moss-uncommonly-adept-lead-removal-researchers-find.htm","title":{"rendered":"Common Cord Moss Uncommonly Adept with Lead Removal, Researchers Find"},"content":{"rendered":"

If there’s a single environmental concern that the American public has become more sensitive to in recent years, it’s probably the threat posed by lead in water. The Flint, Michigan drinking water crisis\u2014which has since been revealed as part of<\/span> a national trend<\/span><\/a> involving<\/span> crumbling infrastructure<\/span><\/a>\u2014is also part of a<\/span> global problem<\/span><\/a>, with the<\/span> World Health Organization identifying lead as one of ten chemicals<\/span><\/a> posing a major public health concern around the world.<\/span><\/p>\n

Worsening the issue is the difficulty that has<\/span> historically complicated the lead removal process<\/span><\/a>. This challenge has prompted researchers to look for new answers, and a team from Japan’s<\/span> RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science<\/span><\/a> (CSRS) has found one potentially ground-breaking solution to the problem of lead in water.<\/span> The team found<\/span><\/a> that <\/span>Funaria hygrometrica<\/span><\/i>, also known as common cord moss or bonfire moss, is particularly good at removing the toxic substance from water.<\/span><\/p>\n

First author Misao Itouga described the inspiration for the work.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOf course we comprehended the risk posed by the biological accumulation of lead in the food chain,\u201d comments Itouga. \u201cSo, we started to research the risks arising from using this biological material as a lead adsorbent material, partnering with a recycling-oriented company on a Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) project.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The team hoped to be able to find a way to make phytoremediation a practical solution for lead removal. Phytoremediation is a more appealing option, because it demands less energy and doesn’t require fossil fuels compared to traditional removal methods. The team started with <\/span>F. hygrometrica<\/span><\/i>, because the moss grows well even in sites contaminated with metals such as zinc, copper, and lead. They discovered that the moss absorbed lead most effectively at the protonemal stage\u2014just after it began growing from the spore stage. This discovery means that the moss is likely to be a wastewater-cleaning dynamo for the chemical and mining industries.<\/span><\/p>\n

To determine just how much ability to absorb metal the moss has, the team exposed protonemal <\/span>F. hygrometrica<\/span><\/i> to prepared solutions of 15 different metals with varying concentrations for 22 hours. After the exposure period, mass-spectrometer analysis revealed that the cells of <\/span>F. hygrometrica <\/span><\/i>moss had absorbed up to 74 percent of their dry weight’s worth of lead\u2014much more than any other metal. Moreover, more than 85 percent of that lead was stored in the cell walls of the protonemal moss cells, indicating that something unique about this plant’s cell walls enables it to thrive in what are normally toxic environments\u2014cleaning them by merely existing.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe hope to develop living protonemal cells into a dry prepared cell wall for removing lead from mine wastewater in the future,\u201d Itouga details. \u201cHowever, for now we are still at the initial stage of METI risk assessment for our biological material.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\"lead\"

Cells treated with 0.1 mm PBCL2. (Credit: RIKEN)<\/p><\/div>\n

These findings can contribute to the<\/span> Sustainable Development Goals<\/span><\/a> set by the United Nations, especially<\/span> Goal 15: the Life on Land goal<\/span><\/a>, which is concerned in part with land degradation and the creation of barren zones through unsustainable industrial practices. The team is currently exploring opportunities to work with recycling-oriented companies, and possibly commercialization of the findings.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cExisting chemical treatment systems for removing lead from water consume high amounts of iron and require neutralizers; because of this they produce high amounts of poisonous byproducts,\u201d comments Itouga. \u201cThese byproducts are now in landfills. These regions eventually become barren zones. Our adsorbent material can reduce the incidence of these barren zones. Moreover, we started a design for greening, (i.e., revegetation using iron-tolerant mosses) recently. These designs can directly contribute to SDGs.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

In this sense, the team has hit upon not just a scientific discovery, but also a design concept\u2014something you don’t see every day.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOur work on this cell wall material and lead binding can help promote understanding of other suitable structures chemical and physical scientists can use in the synthesis of biomimetic material,\u201d Itouga states. \u201cThe moss material is useful for not only metal adsorption, but also to create a new kind of art\u2014for example, in Bonsai and Kokedama plantings, terrariums, and aqua-terrariums.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

These kinds of \u201cworking\u201d art installations may be part of a more sustainable, and cleaner, future.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"lead\"

(A) Colony of gametophytes bearing bright yellowish mature sporophytes. (B) Spore germination at 48 hours after sowing. Scale bar = 20 \u03bcm. (C) Suspension culture in a 0.5 L bottle. (D) SEM photograph of a freeze-dried cell pellet. Bright spots in the inset represent chloroplasts. Scale bar = 250 \u03bcm. A magnified view of the cells is shown in the inset. Scale bar = 10 \u03bcm. (Credit: Authors, RIKEN)<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Researchers have found that the common cord moss can absorb lead very effectively, and are working to transfer that knowledge into lead removal technology.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":28584,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[576,575,103,109,503],"class_list":["post-28580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-csrs","tag-lead","tag-news-2","tag-news-ticker","tag-water-quality"],"remote_post_permalink":false,"remote_post_featured_image":false,"yoast_head":"\nCommon Cord Moss Uncommonly Adept with Lead Removal, Researchers Find<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Researchers have found that the common cord moss can absorb lead very effectively, and are working to transfer that knowledge into lead removal technology.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, 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