Rhizofiltration for removal of inorganic and organic pollutants in groundwater: A review

Groundwater serves as the water recharge of surface water and provides clean water for domestic, industrial, and agricultural usage for human life. However, rapid developments resulted in groundwater contamination by heavy metals, pesticides, waste by-products, cosmetics, pharmaceutics, and biological agents. Groundwater contamination by the percolation of heavy metals (HM) is focused on in this review. Heavy metals known for their persistence, bioaccumulation, and biomagnification properties are hazardous to live organisms. Long-term exposure to heavy metals brings adverse effects on respiratory diseases, cardiovascular disorders, cancer, etc. They are considered toxins, carcinogens, mutagens, and teratogens for humans in low concentrations. Hence, technologies to remediate heavy metals and organic pollutant in groundwater is vital to prevent environmental and health issues. However, current conventional remediation technologies that are expensive, utilize hazardous materials, and produce toxic by-products in effluents are insufficient to alleviate heavy metals' effects in groundwater. Thus, an eco-friendly and cost-effective rhizofiltration method that adsorb, concentrate, and precipitate contaminants in or on plants' rhizosphere is introduced. This review portrays the mechanisms involved in rhizofiltration to remediate heavy metals-contaminated groundwater and describes the gaps for rhizofiltration to be a commercially viable technology.