Each year, vast quantities of herbicides and petroleum hydrocarbons contaminate soils worldwide—posing serious risks to human health, crop production, and the environment. Traditional cleanup methods such as physical and chemical treatments are expensive, labor-intensive, can degrade only part of the contaminants, and often negatively affect soil biological properties.
Published in Emerging Contaminants , a review synthesizes more than 200 recent studies to unpack how soil bacteria, working alongside plants, can break down these widespread organic pollutants. Rhizoremediation — harnessing plant‑root‑associated microbes — stands out as a feasible strategy. Plant root exudates feed beneficial bacteria, which in turn degrade contaminants while easing pollution‑driven stress for host plants.
The findings show that certain soil bacteria, particularly plant growth-promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR), can effectively degrade herbicides and petroleum hydrocarbons when associated with host plants—a process known as rhizoremediation. Plants release organic compounds through their roots that feed these bacteria, while the bacteria in turn break down pollutants and help plants thrive under contaminated conditions.
“Since stressful parameters including contamination decrease plant growth and physiological capabilities, its association with PGPR and other soil degrading bacteria may significantly enhance their bioremediation potential,” explains lead author Mohammad Miransari, who is affiliated with AbtinBerkeh Scientific Ltd. Company in Isfahan, Iran.
More than 80 species of pollutant-degrading bacteria have been identified to date, including Pseudomonas , Bacillus , Rhodococcus , and Arthrobacter . Certain Pseudomonas strains, for example, have been shown to degrade oil at rates of 48–53% while also resisting herbicides such as 2,4-D. The bacterium Agrobacterium rhizogenes AT13 achieved a degradation rate of 99.94% for the herbicide atrazine, using it as the sole nitrogen source.
“We also examined novel approaches, including metagenomics—which allows researchers to study the genetic makeup of entire microbial communities without needing to culture them—as well as CRISPR and machine learning techniques for optimizing bioremediation,” says Miransari. “We found that herbicides are generally more readily biodegradable than petroleum hydrocarbons, due to the persistent molecular structure of the latter.”
The authors believe this review may be suitable for the development of the bacterial strains and plant species, which are of higher efficiency for bioremediation of organic pollutants. They recommend future work in the field to include multi-omics approaches, synthetic microbial community design, nano-enabled bioremediation strategies, and life-cycle assessment of rhizoremediation technologies.
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Contact author details: Mohammad Miransari, Department of Book & Article, AbtinBerkeh Scientific Ltd. Company, Isfahan, Iran. Email: Miransari@AbtinBerkeh.com
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Emerging Contaminants
Literature review
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The most recent in bacterial bioremediation of herbicides and petroleum hydrocarbons: a review
The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: Mohammad Miransari is currently employed by Department of Book&Article, AbtinBerkeh Scientific Ltd. All authors declare that there are no competing interests. The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.