Vol.:(0123456789) 1 3 Chemoecology https://doi.org/10.1007/s00049-019-00293-1 ORIGINAL ARTICLE A preliminary survey of nickel, manganese and zinc (hyper) accumulation in the fora of Papua New Guinea from herbarium X‑ray fuorescence scanning Christina Do 1  · Farida Abubakari 2  · Amelia Corzo Remigio 2  · Gillian K. Brown 3  · Lachlan W. Casey 4  · Valérie Burtet‑Sarramegna 1  · Vidiro Gei 2  · Peter D. Erskine 2  · Antony van der Ent 2,5 Received: 5 October 2019 / Accepted: 11 December 2019 © Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 Abstract The fora of Papua New Guinea is amongst the richest in the world with an estimated 25,000 plant species. The extreme levels of biodiversity, climatic ranges and soil types suggest a high possibility of metal hyperaccumulator plants existing in Papua New Guinea. However, no hyperaccumulator plants have been reported from this region yet. The use of handheld X-ray fuorescence instruments is a non-destructive and efective method for the systematic quantitative assessment of hyperaccumulation in vast numbers of herbarium specimens. X-ray fuorescence scanning was undertaken at the Queens- land Herbarium (Australia) on all Papua New Guinea specimens from seven major families (Celastraceae, Cunoniaceae, Phyllanthaceae, Proteaceae, Rubiaceae, Salicaceae and Violaceae), covering 3164 plant specimens. This preliminary sur- vey revealed the existence of ten zinc hyperaccumulator species (> 3000 µg g −1 Zn), eight manganese accumulator species (> 5000 µg g −1 Mn) and one nickel hyperaccumulator species (> 1000 µg g −1 Ni). These results highlight the potential for discovery of numerous new metal hyperaccumulator plants from the fora of Papua New Guinea if larger-scale systematic screening eforts were undertaken. Keywords Hyperaccumulators · Nickel · Manganese · Ultramafc · X-ray fuorescence · Zinc Introduction Hyperaccumulator plants have the ability to accumulate metal(loid) elements in their leaves at extremely high con- centrations (Jafré et al. 1976; van der Ent et al. 2013). The threshold values for foliar concentrations for various metal(loid)s are 300 µg g −1 for cobalt (Co) and copper (Cu), 1000 µg g −1 for nickel (Ni), 3000 µg g −1 for zinc (Zn), and 10 mg g −1 for manganese (Mn) (van der Ent et al. 2013). Hyperaccumulation is a rare phenomenon occurring in about 700 species or 0.2% of total angio- sperms (Baker 1981; Baker and Brooks 1989; Reeves et al. 2018) and in 1–2% of the fora on ultramafc soils (van der Ent et al. 2015a, b). Currently, there are approximately 523 Ni, 53 Cu, 42 Co, 20 Zn, and 42 Mn hyperaccumulator plant species recorded globally (Reeves 2003; Reeves et al. 2018; van der Ent et al. 2013). Hyperaccumulator plants are interesting models from a biological and evolutionary point of view for studying trace element regulation due to the extreme expression of this trait (Pollard et al. 2002; Jafré et al. 2013; Schiavon and Pilon-Smits 2016). The biomolecular and physiological insights obtained from hyperaccumulator plants can be applied in developing food crops with improved micronutrient profles (White and Broadley 2009; Clemens 2016). Hyperaccumulator plants can also be used in novel phytotechnologies, such as phytoremediation and phytomining, which make use of CHEMOECOLOGY Handling Editor: Marko Rohlfs. * Antony van der Ent a.vanderent@uq.edu.au 1 Institute for Exact and Applied Sciences, Université de la Nouvelle-Calédonie, Nouméa, New Caledonia 2 Centre for Mined Land Rehabilitation, Sustainable Minerals Institute, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia 3 Department of Environment and Science, Queensland Herbarium, Toowong, Australia 4 Centre for Microscopy and Microanalysis, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia 5 Laboratoire Sols et Environnement, Université de Lorraine-INRA, UMR 1120, Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy, France