title: Constitutional tolerance to heavy metals of a fiber crop, ramie (Boehmeria nivea), and its potential usage.
abstract: It is observed that ramie (Boehmeria nivea), an economic fiber crop, can establish and colonize metal-contaminated sites in China. Metal tolerance and accumulation by ramie originating from 13 metal-contaminated and 4 "clean" sites in China were compared under field and hydroponic conditions. All selected populations and germplasms displayed good growth performance under diverse metal-contaminated habitats; while growth responses, metal accumulation and tolerance were similar among the 8 populations and 2 germplasms when exposed to solutions containing elevated As, Cd, Pb, or Zn in the laboratory. These revealed that ramie possesses a certain degree of constitutional metal tolerance. To our knowledge, this is the first report of constitutional metal tolerance possessed by a fiber crop. Ramie can be considered as a good candidate for both fiber production and phytoremediation of sites contaminated by multi-metals, as it accumulates relative low metal concentrations, but possesses both high biomass and high economic value.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol, and School of Life Sciences, Sun Yat-sen (Zhongshan) University, Guangzhou 510275, PR China.
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.forename: W S
authors.initials: WS
authors.lastname: Shu
authors.forename: C Y
authors.initials: CY
authors.lastname: Lan
authors.forename: Z H
authors.initials: ZH
authors.lastname: Ye
authors.forename: R L
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Qiu
authors.forename: Y C
authors.initials: YC
authors.lastname: Jie
authors.forename: G X
authors.initials: GX
authors.lastname: Cui
authors.forename: M H
authors.initials: MH
authors.lastname: Wong
mesh_terms: D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001673:Biodegradation, Environmental; D032402:Boehmeria / Q000187:drug effects / Q000254:growth & development / Q000378:metabolism*; D002681:China; D013058:Mass Spectrometry; D019216:Metals, Heavy / Q000493:pharmacokinetics* / Q000633:toxicity*
chemical_list: D019216:Metals, Heavy