Abstract

Prakash E. Gandhi, Rahu Kiran Chandra and Shashi Montek Sen

Screening of plants for their sensitivity/tolerance level to air pollutants is important because the sensitive plants can serve as bio-indicator and the tolerant plants as sink for controlling air pollution in urban and industrial areas. In order to evaluate the susceptibility level of plants to air pollutants, four parameters namely ascorbic acid, chlorophyll, relative water content and leaf extract pH were determined and computed together in a formulation signifying the air pollution tolerance index (APTI) of plants. APTI values of seven economically important plant species growing in the urban-industrial region of Allahabad were estimated. The order of tolerance is as follows: Artocarpus sp. < Eucalyptus sp. < Citrus lemon < Azadirachta indica < Rosa indica < Aegle marmelos < Mangifera indica. Among the plant studies, Mangifera indica (APTI value 18.51) is considered as a relatively tolerant species and Artocarpus sp. (APTI value 8.75) as most sensitive to air pollutants. The sensitive (Artocarpus sp.) and tolerant species (Mangifera indica) can be used as bio-indicators and as a sink for air pollutants, respectively. The technique provides a reliable method for screening sensitive/tolerant plants under field condition where the airshed is contaminated by a variety of pollutants