This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier The attached copy is furnished to the author for internal non-commercial research and education use, including for instruction at the authors institution and sharing with colleagues Other uses, including reproduction and distribution, or selling or licensing copies, or posting to personal, institutional or third party websites are prohibited In most cases authors are permitted to post their version of the article (e.g in Word or Tex form) to their personal website or institutional repository Authors requiring further information regarding Elsevier’s archiving and manuscript policies are encouraged to visit: http://www.elsevier.com/copyright Author's personal copy Journal of Hazardous Materials 167 (2009) 170–178 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Hazardous Materials journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jhazmat Cadmium uptake potential of Brassica napus cocropped with Brassica parachinensis and Zea mays Ammaiyappan Selvam, Jonathan Woon-Chung Wong ∗ Sino-Forest Applied Research Centre for Pearl River Delta Environment, Department of Biology, Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong, SAR, Hong Kong a r t i c l e i n f o Article history: Received July 2008 Received in revised form 11 December 2008 Accepted 19 December 2008 Available online 30 December 2008 Keywords: Cocropping Hyperaccumulation Phytoextraction Phytoremediation a b s t r a c t Cadmium uptake potential of Brassica napus cocropped with B parachinensis or Zea mays plants in split pot (allow the solutes to pass but prevent the interaction of roots between compartments) experiments was evaluated Plants were grown in split pots filled with soil spiked at 0, 3, 6, 12, 25 and 50 mg Cd/kg soil Biomass and Cd uptake were detemined after weeks, and rhizospheric soil solutions, extracted using soil probes, were analyzed for pH and water soluble Cd at weekly intervals Cadmium treatments affected the biomass Cadmium concentration in the shoots of B napus was higher when cocropped with B parachinensis and significantly higher with Z mays; however, the biomass was negatively affected implying the higher nutrient apportionment to the crop plants than B napus Concentration of Cd in B napus was higher in shoots than in roots as revealed by shoot/root Cd quotient and was always >1; the quotient for B parachinensis was ∼1 and that of Z mays was