Heavy metal pollution is one of the major global issues arising from various anthropogenic activities. The natural habitat and human health may be at peril from heavy metal exposure since they are tenacious, bio-accumulative, and non-biodegradable. Therefore, eradicating heavy metals from the soil ecosystem is a crucial responsibility to create a secure, viable, and zero-waste ecosystem. There are numerous techniques for eliminating heavy metals from the environment, but each has its own benefits and drawbacks. When a biological agent is used to degrade pollutants, this process is called bioremediation. Nano-phytoremediation, an emerging bioremediation approach in the field of nanotechnology, uses biosynthesized nanoparticles and plant species for the removal of toxic heavy metals from the environment. It is an efficient, economical, and environmentally friendly technique. The adverse consequences of metal exposure on different plant species have been discovered to be greatly reduced by engineered nanomaterials. Because of their tiny dimensions and huge surface area, nanomaterials have an attraction towards metals and can thus quickly enter the contaminated zone of ecosystems that are metal-challenged. The current review provides an overview of various aspects of nano-phytoremediation for heavy metal remediation.

Urbanization is the process by which towns and cities are formed and become larger as more and more people begin living and working in central areas. According to 2001 census, the urban population of the country was 286.11 million, living in 5161 towns, which constitutes 27.81% of the total country’s population. However, the same as per 2011 census has risen to 377.16 million viz. 32.16% of the total country’s population and the number of towns has gone up to 7935. The rate of urban growth in the country is very high as compared to developed countries, and the large cities are becoming larger mostly due to continuous migration of population to these cities. India’s current urban population exceeds the whole population of the United States, the world’s third largest country. By 2050, over half of India’s population is expected to be urban dwellers. This creates enormous pressure on existing urban infrastructure.Urbanization trend in the State of Kerala shows marked peculiarities. The main reason for urban population growth is the increase in the number of urban areas and urbanization of the peripheral areas of the existing major urban centers. However, unlike the other parts of the country the Urbanization in Kerala is not limited to the designated cities and towns. The difference between rural and urban agglomerations is very negligible as far as Kerala is concerned. The Kerala society by and large can be termed as urbanized. Kerala has been witnessing rapid urbanization since 1980.The present study, is an attempt to analyses the extent of land use/ land cover changes in the Municipality over the years from 2012 to 2017 and land surface variation over the years from 2000 to 2017.The land use/ land cover pattern of 2012 to 2017 was extracted from High resolution images of the study area were downloaded from Google Earth API and the Land Surface Temperature changes were analyzed from the thermal bands of the Landsat Imageries.

Significant threats to the environment and human health arise from contamination of heavy metals, especially in urban and industrial locations where conventional remediation methods are costly and intrusive.Phytoremediation is a sustainable and environmentally beneficial method for removing toxic contaminants in different environmental compartments. It uses the plant’s innate ability to absorb, stabilize, and detoxify heavy metals. Some plants are hyperaccumulators and have a high capacity for sequestering and absorbing lead, making them attractive options for phytoremediation. In the present work, we are exploring the effectiveness of a medicinal plant Ecliptaprostrata, in removing an insidious heavy metal, lead, from the contaminated environment. We had done a greenhouse study using Bhringaraj in a free-floating culture system spiked with different lead concentrations. The parameters analyzedinclude: chlorophyll content, carbohydrate, proline and heavy metal accumulation in the different plant parts in different time intervals. By improving Ecliptaprostrata’s lead accumulation and tolerance through the use of nanoparticles and chelating agents, along with advances in genetic engineering, phytoremediation becomes a more practical and efficient choice for large-scale lead decontamination.