ASSESSMENT OF PUBLISHED LITERATURE PERTAINING TO THE UPTAKE ACCUMULATION, TRANSLOCATION, ADHESION AND BIOTRANSFORMATION OF ORGANIC-CHEMICALS BY VASCULAR PLANTS

Information in the UTAB data base was used to determine the general makeup of published data pertaining to how vascular plants influence organic chemicals in the environment. UTAB contains information on the uptake/accumulation, translocation, adhesion, and biotransformation of xenobiotic organic chemicals by vascular plants. The percentage distribution of data (records) in UTAB among four important fate processes was 58, 16, 7, and 19 for uptake/accumulation, translocation, adhesion, and biotransformation, respectively. The tabulated data show the 30 most frequently reported chemicals, the 30 plants most often studied, and the frequency of examining plants maintained under different experimental conditions (contaminated site, controlled environments, etc.). Sixty-five percent of the 1,047 chemicals in the data base are pesticides, and data (records) pertaining to these compounds account for 90% of the information in the data base. Crop species account for 33% of the plants and 77% of the data in UTAB. These summary values illustrate the imbalance of attention given to agrichemicals vs. industrial and municipal waste compounds, and emphasize the need for additional research addressing the influence of plants on environmental pollutants, with special attention given to industrial pollutants and native plants.