Jin Hee Park (PhD Student)
University of South Australia

Project Title
The role of bacteria and soil amendments on the phytostabilization of metal contaminated soils

Biography
Jin Hee majored in applied biology and chemistry at the undergraduate school of Seoul National University in South Korea. She majored in environmental geochemistry at graduate school in the same university. Jin Hee's master thesis was cadmium biosorption and effect of soil bacteria on the plant uptake of Pb, Zn and Cd. For three and half months from June 2002, she worked as a visiting researcher at the Department of Trace Elements Analysis, Austrian Agency for Food and Safety in Austria. After getting her Master's degree, she worked at the Analysis Research Lab of Amorepacific corporation R&D center for 4 years. Now, Jin Hee is a Ph.D student at centre for contamination assessment & remediation of UniSA.

Start Date
August 2007

Project Details
Phytoremediaton is environmentally friendly and cost-effective compared to traditional remediation techniques. However, there are some limitations inhibiting widespread application of phytoremediation owing to slow growth rate of plants and low biomass accumulation in heavy metal contaminated soil. Therefore, new research approaches are required to enhance phytoremediation efficiency. In this regard, applications of the bacteria and soil amendments on the phytoremediation to immobilize metal within soils, which is called phytostabilization, have attracted attention. The research will focus on the evaluation of the microbial effects on plant growth and phytostabilization capacity. This involves isolating metal tolerant bacteria from heavy metal contaminated soils and their characterization. Plant growth promoting effect of bacteria in relation to heavy metal dynamics will be investigated by greenhouse pot experiments. The influence of bacterial activity and soil amendments on the immobilization of heavy metals in contaminated soils will be examined.