Chapter 29: Rhizoremediation

Abstract

Over the past centuries, technological revolutions have brought about new sources of soil and (ground)water pollution . The clean-up costs by conventional remediation methods are often exorbitantly high, retarding soil remediation if performed at all. This is a severe problem as the health consequences of soil pollution can be considerable. Against these drawbacks, rhizoremediation which is an inexpensive and sustainable technology, based on the actions of biodegradative microorganisms in the rhizosphere and the plant phytoremediation capacity, has gained increased attention. During the symbiotic interactions in the rhizosphere, ectomycorrhizal fungi extend the belowground surface area of plants where billions of root-associated bacteria help to take-up minerals and pollutants, produce vitamins and plant hormones and degrade organic compounds or sequestrate metals. Genomics technologies and systems-based approaches have tremendously advanced the way we investigate the plant “black box” and lead to new insights about how we can exploit the beneficial plant-microbe association in terms of soil remediation, the topic of this chapter.