الفهرس | Only 14 pages are availabe for public view |
Abstract Herbicides are widely used to control the proliferation of weeds, correlating with an increase in agricultural productivity. However, the harm to human populations’ health is well known and has been shown in a wide range of scientific investigations. Agricultural herbicide applications have also contaminated surface and ground waterways as a result of runoff and leaching into the soil. Several experiments were conducted at the Faculty of Agriculture, Tanta University, to investigate the fate of several common herbicides (namely atrazine, metribuzin, pendimethalin, and linuron) in soil and water using sensitive plants as indicators. The sensitivity of seedlings from different plant species to the herbicides was measured, identifying the most sensitive plant for each herbicide. The species used were wheat, barley, oats, soybeans, cucumber, and Jute mallow. Oats were found to be the most sensitive to atrazine, metribuzin, cucumber to linuron, and wheat to pendimethalin. The results revealed a positive correlation between herbicide concentrations and their biological effects on the seedlings of all the studied plant species. Sensitivity to the toxic effects of these herbicides was demonstrated at levels lower than one part per million for all the tested plant species. |