Potential of urban trees for mitigating heavy metal pollution in the city of Novi Sad, Serbia

Abstract

The current study analyzed heavy metal (HM) concentrations in the urban soil and tree leaves in the city of Novi Sad, Serbia, with the aim to identify specific tree species with good HM bioaccumulative abilities that can mitigate HM pollution in urban areas. Zinc (Zn), copper (Cu) and lead (Pb) were selected for the analysis of tree leaves and soil at 16 locations close to urban roads, main boulevards and high-traffic streets. Leaf material of four most common tree species: Platanus × acerifolia (Aiton) Willd., Celtis occidentalis L., Tilia argentea L. and Quercus robur L. and soil samples were analyzed with the aim to identify the potential hotspots and sources of pollution. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) and t test was applied to the available data sets to find differences between the HM concentrations in the analyzed trees and soil samples. Geographic information system (GIS) mapping was used for visualization of the concentration distributions and illustration of the HM contaminated hotspots. Bioconcentration factors (BCF) were calculated and they showed that the plants of the species Celtis occidentalis L. have the ability to retain Cu, the species Quercus robur L. retains mostly Zn, Tilia argentea L. accumulates Pb, while Platanus x acerifolia (Aiton) Willd. retains the smallest amount of the tested HMs.