Ecologically Safe Technology for Bioremediation of Soils Polluted by Toxic Chemical Substances

Abstract

Pollution of the environment by toxicants presents a severe hazard to health and nature. Processes of soil self-purification, owing to high concentrations of pollutants, and their stability in its environment do take place, but they are very slow and require active human intervention. Processes of soil formation proceed even slower: 1 cm of soil humus is formed under natural conditions every 300-400 years. In our opinion, the use of biological methods for remediation seems the most ecologically friendly and promising, because they do not destroy soil fertility or its properties. The Department for Ecological Biotechnology at the RCT&HRB develops biological methods for the removal or decomposition of environmental xenobiotics as the main direction of its activity. Three main methods form the basis of our approaches: 1) microbiological destruction using natural strains as the primary method; 2) the use of earthworms for intensification of microbial decomposition of pollutants and restoration of natural soil microflora with microrganism-symbionts, and; 3) application of various products of biological origin (biohumus, chitin powder of crustaceans, bentonite clay, etc.) as sorbents. The developed approach is considered to be a complex system of soil bioremediation (Fig.1).