Articles
INVESTIGATION OF THE EFFECTS OF PEROXYACETYL NITRATE (PAN) ON PLANTS
Article number
440_42
Pages
239 – 244
Language
Abstract
Peroxyacetyl nitrate (PAN) is a phytotoxic air pollutant generated by the reaction of hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides under the action of light.
This pollutant can be a restraint of plant growth in closed ecosystems as well as in the field.
In spite of its importance as a phytotoxicant, there has been much difficulty to investigate the effects of this pollutant on plants in experimental conditions.
The main reasons for this were: (1) the air exposed to plants was inevitably contaminated with reagents other than PAN because of difficulty in the preparation of high-purity PAN; (2) control of PAN concentration in the exposure air has been difficult because low-concentration PAN is accurately measurable only with an electron capture detection gas chromatograph, which just outputs intermittent PAN concentrations with delay time.
Therefore, aiming at overcoming these difficulties, this research newly developed a PAN exposure system.
The important aspects of this system are (1) preparation of high-purity PAN by a recently reported method, (2) continuous monitoring of changes in PAN concentration with a chemiluminescent NOx analyzer, which detects some nitrogen-containing organic compounds comprising PAN, and (3) automatic control of PAN concentration in the exposure air by a computer.
Furthermore, this research investigates susceptibilities to and foliar uptake rates of PAN on nine herbaceous species.
The result showed that the susceptibilities to PAN are not well correlated with the foliar uptake rates of PAN among the tested species, suggesting that differences in susceptibility to this pollutant among species are dependent on differences in the competence of the metabolic processes to detoxicate this pollutant.
This pollutant can be a restraint of plant growth in closed ecosystems as well as in the field.
In spite of its importance as a phytotoxicant, there has been much difficulty to investigate the effects of this pollutant on plants in experimental conditions.
The main reasons for this were: (1) the air exposed to plants was inevitably contaminated with reagents other than PAN because of difficulty in the preparation of high-purity PAN; (2) control of PAN concentration in the exposure air has been difficult because low-concentration PAN is accurately measurable only with an electron capture detection gas chromatograph, which just outputs intermittent PAN concentrations with delay time.
Therefore, aiming at overcoming these difficulties, this research newly developed a PAN exposure system.
The important aspects of this system are (1) preparation of high-purity PAN by a recently reported method, (2) continuous monitoring of changes in PAN concentration with a chemiluminescent NOx analyzer, which detects some nitrogen-containing organic compounds comprising PAN, and (3) automatic control of PAN concentration in the exposure air by a computer.
Furthermore, this research investigates susceptibilities to and foliar uptake rates of PAN on nine herbaceous species.
The result showed that the susceptibilities to PAN are not well correlated with the foliar uptake rates of PAN among the tested species, suggesting that differences in susceptibility to this pollutant among species are dependent on differences in the competence of the metabolic processes to detoxicate this pollutant.
Authors
K. Tobe, K. Omasa
Keywords
air pollution, automatic control, exposure system, foliar uptake, PAN, peroxyacetyl nitrate, susceptibility
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