Ulva lactuca´s environmental applications: pollution biomonitoring and remediation

ARECO, MARÍA M.; SALOMONE V.N; AFONSO, MARÍA DOS SANTOS

Conferencia; International Conference on Aquaculture, fisheries, and marine biology; 2023

Pollution of natural waters has become a major issue all over the world. As a result, scientists arestudying new and alternative technologies not only to identify the presence of different pollutants in the environments but to remove them from waters and industrial effluents. In these senses, in recent years various red, green and brown seaweeds were investigated as potential bioindicators of contaminants in the environment; as well as their use in remediation process. The green marine macroalga, Ulva lactuca (Chlorophyta) is very common at coastal areas, and is a bloom forming macroalgae that occur in shallow estuaries. This species has a high bonding affinity with heavy metals and several organic compounds due to the presence of different functional groups on their cell walls (such as carboxyl, hydroxyl, phosphate or amine) that can bind metal and/or organic ions. These characteristics makes it suitable to be used as a bioindicator of marine pollution and for remediation purposes. In general, the investigations are focused on the application of dried algae biomass to promote the removal of different contaminants, principally metals from aqueous solutions (biosorption); however, the use of living organisms (bioaccumulation), may be advantageous. While growing, living macroalgae can remove simultaneously pollutants and nutrients (nitrates and phosphates) from wastewaters and capture CO 2 emissions. In this context, the present chapter will conduct a comprehensive inquiry on the advances related to the possibility of Ulva lactuca to be used as a bioindicator of contamination as well as its capability to be employed for the removal of pollutants from the surrounding medium. Besides, it will deeply review these different approaches and analyses the advantages and disadvantages of each, as exposed on the literature, as well as the challenges of these alternatives confront as sustainable remediations technologies.