Heavy metal accumulation potential of aquatic fungi

Increased environmental pollution has necessitated the need for eco-friendly clean-up strategies. Heavy metals such as cadmium, arsenic, mercury chromium and lead are known environmental pollutants that exert noxious effects on the morpho-physiological and biological attributes of plants and animals. Unlike natural toxins, heavy metals can't be annihilated, yet should either be changed over to a nontoxic stable structure or eliminated. As heavy metals are extremely sensitive at low concentrations and can be stored in food webs, posing a serious public health risk. Different organic pollutants and metals are not degradable and remain in their environment for a long time. Fungi has high resistant toward various toxins and xenobiotic compounds, including antibiotics, fungicides and heavy metals. Fungal strains specially have potentials as effective agents for bioremediated clean-up of heavy metal polluted environments. Fungi can accumulate metal and radionuclide species by physico-chemical and biological mechanisms including extracellular binding by metabolites and biopolymers, binding to specific polypeptides and metabolism-dependent accumulation. This chapter stipulate the direct and indirect effects of heavy metals on organisms and use of fungi to remove, recover metals, and metalloids from the polluted environment.