Published in Scientific Papers. Series A. Agronomy, Vol. LXII, Issue 1
Written by Amalia Carmen MITELUȚ, Elisabeta Elena POPA, Paul Alexandru POPESCU, Maria RAPA, Mona Elena POPA
Plastics are ideal for many applications such as packaging, building materials and different commodities, due to their high durability properties, large availability and lower price. Their widespread use leads to waste disposal problems as plastics degrade in a long period of time, and because of their resistance to microbial degradation, they accumulate in the environment, having a strong negative impact. These facts have led to an increasing interest in the development of biodegradable polymeric materials derived from renewable resources as a method for manufacturing environmentally friendly materials. In order to assess the environmental sustainability, biodegradation studies of PLA/chitosan materials were performed. After the biodegradation process of the tested materials, the soils were analysed in order to evaluate their ecotoxicity using the seed germination bioassay. For this purpose, samples of soil were analysed after 50/100/150 days of biodegradation process and initial soil was used as control. An extraction in water was performed for each sample of soil and the resulted supernatant was diluted to yield 0, 25, 50, 75 and 100% supernatant (extract). The dilutions were then used for seed germination bioassay on radish (Raphanus sativus) and cucumber (Cucumis sativus) seeds. The global germination index (GI), was also calculated. The obtained results showed that the tested soils proved to have a nontoxic effect over the radish and cucumber seeds development, obtaining a GI over 80%.
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