title: Potential of monitoring nuclides with the epiphyte Tillandsia usneoides: Uptake and localization of 133Cs.
abstract: Epiphytic Tillandsia plants are efficient air pollution biomonitors and traditionally used to monitor atmospheric heavy metal pollution, but rarely nuclides monitoring. Here we evaluated the potential of Tillandsia usneoides for monitoring (133)Cs and investigated if Cs was trapped by the plant external surface structures. The results showed that T. usneoides was able to survive relatively high Cs stress. With the increase of Cs solution concentration, the total of Cs in plants increased significantly, which suggests that the plants could accumulate Cs quickly and effectively. Therefore, T. usneoides has considerable potential for monitoring Cs polluted environments. In addition, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energy dispersive spectrometer (EDS) analysis showed that Cs was detected in each type of cells in foliar trichomes, and the ratio of Cs in the internal disc cell was higher than that in ring cell and wing cell, which indicates that the mechanism of adsorption Cs in Tillandsia has an active component.
authors.affiliation: School of Life Science and Engineering, Southwest University of Science and Technology, Mianyang 621010, Sichuan, China.
authors.forename: Peng
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Guiling
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Zheng
authors.forename: Xuan
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Pemberton
mesh_terms: D000397:Air Pollution / Q000032:analysis; D000818:Animals; D002586:Cesium / Q000032:analysis / Q000378:metabolism*; D004784:Environmental Monitoring / Q000379:methods*; D019216:Metals, Heavy / Q000032:analysis / Q000378:metabolism*; D008855:Microscopy, Electron, Scanning; D018515:Plant Leaves / Q000737:chemistry / Q000378:metabolism; D031232:Tillandsia / Q000737:chemistry / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D019216:Metals, Heavy; D002586:Cesium