Genetic Engineering of Alfalfa for Remediation of Soil Contaminated with Heavy Metals and Residual Crude Oil

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Rapid industrialization, ever increasing population, and other human activities are the major causes of massive environmental pollution around the globe. In addition, Kuwait has experienced one of tie major environmental destruction during the war. Millions of gallons of crude oil had been released causing massive destruction of the environment with toxic petroleum hydrocarbons and associated heavy metals. Phytoremediation has a proven potential to remediate soil contaminated with heavy metals and residual petroleum hydrocarbons. Furthermore, recent technological advancements in the field of genetic engineering have opened new avenues to use this technology in environmental protection. Novel genes involved in the regulation of heavy metaltolerance and accumulation in plants have been identified, characterized and demonstrated their functionality conclusively in transgenic plants. With this background, the research proposal is focused on application of this technology to create genetically engineered plants that are highly suitable for phytoremediation of damaged ecosystems in Kuwait. The main objective of this investigation is to develop, optimize and enhance the costeffectiveness of this technology. There is also scope for commercialization of the technology due to its novelty and cost-effective nature.