Plant enhanced degradation of phenanthrene in the contaminated soil

The degradative characteristics of phenanthrene, microbial biomass carbon, plate counts of heterotrophic bacteria and most probable number (MPN) of phenanthrene degraders in non-rhizosphere or rhizosphere soils with uninoculating or inoculating phenanthrene degraders were measured. At the initial concentration of 20 mg phenanthrene/kg soil, the half-lives of phenanthrene in uninoculated non-rhizosphere soil, uninoculated rhizosphere soil, inoculated non-rhizosphere soil, and inoculated rhizosphere soil were measured to be 81.5, 47.8, 15.1 and 6.4 d, respectively, and corresponding kinetic data fitted first-order kinetics. The highest degradation rate of phenanthrene was observed in inoculated rhizosphere soil. The degradative characteristics of phenanthrene were closely related to the effects of vegetation on soil microbial process. Vegetation could enhance the magnitude of rhizosphere microbial communities, microbial biomass content, and heterotrophic bacterial community, but barely influence those community components responsible for phenanthrene degradation. Results suggested that combination of vegetation and inoculation with degrading microorganisms of target organic contaminants was a better pathway to enhance degradation of the organic contaminants in soil.