Evaluation Of Tolerance And Sensitivity Of Selected Plant Species With Special Reference To Gasoline Exhaust Pollution

Emissions from motor vehicle exhausts have been shown to have deleterious effects on the physiology of plant species. Our present study focuses on evaluating the tolerance and sensitivity of selected plant species viz. Dracaena deremensis (good absorber of VOCs) and Dianthus caryophyllus (susceptible to ethylene and formaldehyde (VOCs)) at selected sites which are differentiated on the basis of high gasoline exhaust emission source (Site I) and less gasoline exhaust emission source (Site II & III). For this, Air Pollution Tolerance Index (APTI) and selected physiological parameters were taken into account i.e. total chlorophyll, ascorbic acid, pH, relative water content, total protein and Nitrate reductase (NR). The results showed that D. deremensis have high chlorophyll content, ascorbic acid content, protein content, with high NR activity as compared to D. caryophyllus at all the selected sites. As per Air Pollution Tolerance Index (APTI) D. deremensis has value of 60.60, 55.25 & 55.93 at Site I, II & III respectively which comes under tolerant range and D . caryophyllus has value of 14.82, 15.41 & 15.93 at Site I, II & III respectively which comes under sensitive range. Thus, study ends up with the conclusion that D. deremensis was found to be more tolerant than D. caryophyllus at all sites and thus D. deremensis can be used as a tool in mitigation of gasoline exhaust pollution and D. caryophyllus can be used as an bioindicator for indicating gasoline exhaust pollution.