title: Linking plant tissue concentrations and soil copper pools in urban contaminated soils.
abstract: Copper tissue concentrations of radish (Raphanus sativa cv. Cherry Belle), lettuce (Lactuca sativa cv. Buttercrunch) and ryegrass (Lolium perenne cv. Barmultra) grown in a greenhouse in urban contaminated soils are compared to total, soluble and free ion copper pools. The tissue concentrations of copper vary between 8.1 and 82.6 mg Cu kg(-1) dry tissue and the total soil copper content varies between 32 and 640 mg Cu kg(-1) dry soil. The linear regressions with cupric ion activity and total soil copper are both significant (p < 0.01), but cupric ion activity yields a higher level of statistical significance in every case. The results support the hypothesis that free metal in the soil solution is a better indicator of plant metal bioavailability than either total or soluble metal.
authors.affiliation: Environmental Chemistry Research Laboratory, Department of Natural Resource Sciences, McGill University, Macdonald Campus, Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue, Québec H9X 3V9, Canada.
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Sauvé
authors.forename: N
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Cook
authors.forename: W H
authors.initials: WH
authors.lastname: Hendershot
authors.forename: M B
authors.initials: MB
authors.lastname: McBride