Bioswales’ ability to slow storm water runoff and sequester heavy metals motivated our study of an arid, southern California bioswale. We characterized the location-specific sequestration of a large set of anthropogenic and natural-occurring metals in this bioswale by quantifying the pseudo-total metal concentrations of the surface soil and generating a heat map of each metal’s concentration using Empirical Bayesian Kriging. In addition, we investigated the effect of depth on metal concentration, uptake of metals into native plants and their rhizospheres, and preferential sequestration of metals into the exchangeable, carbonate, iron/manganese mineral, and organic soil fractions. The relationship between the statistical significance of a metal’s sequestration along the bioswale and the competition for metals between the iron/manganese mineral and organic soil fractions in bioswale soil is determined by separate experiments conducted within a bioreactor. An oscillating reduction potential is applied by the bioreactor to simulate oxic/anoxic cycles, and iron/manganese minerals are added in varying amounts to evaluate how the chemical adsorption of metals influences their location-specific sequestration.<br/>

Robust spatial analysis of sequestered metals in an arid Southern California bioswale: Relating sequestration efficiency to preferential metal binding in soil

255th National Meeting (2018)

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