Heavy metals in soils with special reference to Egyptian soils and their characteristics

Abstract

Soil is a complicated system governed by its components being affected by several physical, chemical and mineralogical modifications through various cyclic formations. Plants obtain most of their nutrient requirements from the soil media, which are continuously cycled by means of bio-chemical weathering processes. Moustafa and El-Yazal (1980) reported that physical features of could have an impact in terms of status of nutrients in soil as well as their uptake by plant. Zhu and Alva (1993) added that chemical and mineralogical properties also affecting the distribution of nutritional metals among soil fraction. Soil degradation can be considered as the reduction in soil capacity for plant production. The reasons could be physically or chemically origins, resulting in a net decline of fertility, increase of salinity and sodicity, increase of contamination and pollution particularly with heavy metals (Shaimaa, 2013b).