Plant growth-promoting bacteria for remediation of heavy metal contaminated soil: Characteristics, application and prospects

Remediating soils contaminated with heavy metals due to urbanization and industrialization is very important not only for human health but also for ecosystem sustainability. Of the available remediation technologies for heavy metal-contaminated soils, phytoremediation is a relatively low-cost environmentfriendly technology which preserves biodiversity and soil fertility. The application of plant growth-promoting bacteria (PGPB) during the phytoremediation of heavy metal-contaminated soils can enhance plant growth against heavy metal toxicity and increase heavy metal removal efficiency. In this study, the sources of heavy metals that have adverse effects on microorganisms, plants, and humans, and the plant growthpromoting traits of PGPB are addressed and the research trends of PGPB-assisted phytoremediation over the last 10 years are summarized. In addition, the effects of environmental factors and PGPB inoculation methods on the performance of PGPB-assisted phytoremediation are discussed. For the innovation of PGPB-assisted phytoremediation, it is necessary to understand the behavior of PGPB and the interactions among plant, PGPB, and indigenous microorganisms in the field.