Effect of treated municipal wastewater on lead and nickel concentration of pepper and soil

The use of treated municipal wastewater for irrigation in arid and semi-arid regions like Iran was considered in recent decades. Wastewater irrigation could cause excessive accumulation of heavy metals in agricultural soils. Soil contamination with these elements lead to high metals uptake by crops and thus affect food chain. In this research the distribution of heavy metals in pepper tissues after irrigation with wastewater was investigated. For this reason a pot experiment was carried out and a completely randomized design was used. Different percents of treated wastewater were applied for irrigation. Increasing the percent of wastewater had no significant effect on lead and nickel soil and tissues concentrations. lead and nickel in the available soil were still less than allowable. Before planting lead and nickel soil concentrations were almost the same but at the end of the growing season lead tissue concentrations were about 2 times more than nickel concentrations. The highest lead and nickel tissue concentrations were in pepper roots and the lowest concentrations were in pepper fruits.