An experiment was conducted to investigate the response of periphyton biomass to addition of phosphorus (P) in an aquatic ecosystem dominated by submersed plants. Aquatic ecosystems dominated by Hydrilla verticillata (L.f.) Royle and Vallisneria natans (Lour.) Hara were constructed in mesocosm aquaria. Mesocosms were dosed weekly with different P loads (0 μg/L/Week and 100 μg/L/Week) for 17 wee...

Mercury at low concentrations represents a major hazard to microorganisms. Inorganic mercury has been reported to produce harmful effects at 5 microg/l in a culture medium. Organomercury compounds can exert the same effect at concentrations 10 times lower than this. The organic forms of mercury are generally more toxic to aquatic organisms and birds than the inorganic forms. Aquatic plants are ...

Aquatic plants have attracted attention in recent years because of the unexpected presence of CAM (e.g. Keeley 1981; Richardson et al. 1984) and C4 (Bowes & Salvucci 1984; Spencer, Wetzel & Teeri 1996; Reiskind et al. 1997; Keeley 1998a) photosynthetic pathways. Indeed, it now appears that the aquatic environment is home to as great a diversity of photosynthetic pathways as terrestrial environm...

The distribution of aquatic vegetation and associated community diversity and biomass in the Poyang Lake were investigated. The results showed that (1) 43 species of aquatic vascular plants were found in the Poyang Lake watershed which belonged to 22 families; (2) the vegetation of the Poyang Lake scattered in different areas which could be divided into 31 major plant communities and 5 plant zo...

The aim of this study was to compare the selected aquatic plants ability to remove nitrate from wastewater. Excess of these nutrients in water can directly affect human health (methemoglobinaemia) or indirectly through the products of secondary pollution include eutrophication. Negative impact of nutrients excess in surface water often causes the destruction of water ecosystems, and therefore, ...

The aim of this study was to compare the selected aquatic plants ability to remove nitrate from wastewater. Excess of these nutrients in water can directly affect human health (methemoglobinaemia) or indirectly through the products of secondary pollution include eutrophication. Negative impact of nutrients excess in surface water often causes the destruction of water ecosystems, and therefore, ...

Aquatic plants are phylogenetically well dispersed across the angiosperms. Reproductive and other life-history traits of aquatic angiosperms are closely associated with specific growth forms. Hydrophilous pollination exhibits notable examples of convergent evolution in angiosperm reproductive structures, and hydrophiles exhibit great diversity in sexual system. In this study, we reconstructed a...

The effects of physiological integration on clonal plants growing in aquatic and terrestrial habitats have been extensively studied, but little is known about the role in the extension of amphibious clonal plants in the heterogeneous aquatic-terrestrial ecotones, especially when the water environments are polluted by heavy metals. Ramets of the amphibious clonal herb Alternanthera philoxeroides...

Italy is recognized as one of the prominent hot spot areas for plant diversity at regional and global scale, hosting a rich range of ecosystems and habitat types. This is especially true considering aquatic habitats, which represent a major portion of the total water surfaces in the Mediterranean region. Nevertheless, only a scant attention was paid to clarify the species richness of aquatic pl...