Contamination assessment of heavy metals in agricultural soil, in the liwa area (UAE)

Author First name, Last name, Institution

Ahmed A. Al-Taani, Zayed University
Yousef Nazzal, Zayed UniversityFollow
Fares M. Howari, Zayed University
Jibran Iqbal, Zayed UniversityFollow
Nadine Bou Orm, Zayed University
Cijo Madathil Xavier, Zayed University
Alina Bărbulescu, Universitatea Transilvania din Brasov
Manish Sharma, Zayed University
Cristian Stefan Dumitriu, Universitatea Transilvania din Brasov

ORCID Identifiers

0000-0002-3571-9168

0000-0002-8092-5868

0000-0002-8655-5810

0000-0003-0140-2661

0000-0003-1915-0175

0000-0001-9840-2443

Document Type

Article

Source of Publication

Toxics

Publication Date

3-1-2021

Abstract

The Liwa area is a primary food production area in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and has intensively been used for agriculture. This study investigates the pollution levels with heavy metals in agricultural soils from the Liwa area. Thirty-two soil samples were analyzed for Mn, Zn, Cr, Ni, Cu, Pb, Cd, Co, and As. Results revealed that heavy metal levels varied in the ranges 220.02– 311.21, 42.39–66.92, 43.43–71.55, 32.86–52.12, 10.29–21.70, 2.83–8.84, 0.46–0.69, 0.03–0.37 mg/kg for Mn, Zn, Cr, Ni, Cu, Pb, Cd, Co, and As, respectively. All samples presented low As concentrations with an average of 0.01 mg/kg. The variations in bulk metal contents in the soil samples were related to multiple sources, including agrochemicals, atmospheric dust containing heavy metals, and traf-fic-related metals. Enrichment factor analysis indicates that Cd, Ni, Zn, and Cr were highly enriched in soils, and they could originate from non-crustal sources. Based on the geo-accumulation index (Igeo), the soil samples appeared uncontaminated with Mn, Cr, Zn, Pb, Co, As, Cu, uncontaminated to moderately contaminated with Ni and moderately contaminated with Cd. The contamination factors suggest low contamination, except for Ni, which showed moderate contamination. The average pollution load index (PLI) revealed unpolluted to low pollution of all soil samples. The ecological risk assessment (PERI) showed that all heavy metals posed a low risk, except for Cd which exhibited a high ecological risk.

DOI Link

10.3390/toxics9030053

Publisher

MDPI AG

Volume

9

Issue

3

Disciplines

Life Sciences

Keywords

Abu Dhabi, Agriculture, Ecological risk assessment, Heavy metals, Liwa, Pollution indices, Soil, UAE

Scopus ID

85102919545

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Recommended Citation

Al-Taani, Ahmed A.; Nazzal, Yousef; Howari, Fares M.; Iqbal, Jibran; Bou Orm, Nadine; Xavier, Cijo Madathil; Bărbulescu, Alina; Sharma, Manish; and Dumitriu, Cristian Stefan, "Contamination assessment of heavy metals in agricultural soil, in the liwa area (UAE)" (2021). All Works. 4086.
https://zuscholars.zu.ac.ae/works/4086

Indexed in Scopus

yes

Open Access

yes

Open Access Type

Gold: This publication is openly available in an open access journal/series