Vol.:(0123456789) 1 3 Bulletin of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology (2023) 110:80 https://doi.org/10.1007/s00128-023-03719-3 Investigating the Biochemical Responses in Wheat Cultivars Exposed to Thermal Power Plant Emission Yogesh Kumar 1,2  · Usha Mina 2,3  · Vishnu D. Rajput 4  · Tatiana Minkina 4  · Soora Naresh Kumar 2  · Ramesh Chandra Harit 2  · Manoj Chandra Garg 1 Received: 8 December 2022 / Accepted: 21 March 2023 © The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2023 Abstract The current study aimed to assess how high concentrations of ozone (O 3 ) and suspended particulate matter (SPM) alter biochemical properties of high yielding wheat cultivars (i.e., HD3086 and HD2967) grown under 10 km radius in 8 villages, located around Thermal Power Plant (TPP), Auraiya, Uttar Pradesh, India. Significant foliar damage was brought on by O 3 and SPM exposure in both wheat cultivars and noted for consecutive 2 years as per emission patterns, air movement and biochemical defense capabilities. The detected air pollutants at the chosen experimental site ranged from 34 to 46 ppb O 3 and 139–189 µg/m 3 SPM. Range of biochemical parameter for both cultivars are as pH 6.6–7.1, relative water content (RWC) 44–62%, chlorophyll 0.23–0.35 mg/g, ascorbic acid (AA) 54–68 mg/g and air pollution tolerance index (APTI) 47–72. It has been observed that SPM deposition had a meaningful impact (P-value = 0.05) on the chlorophyll, pH, RWC and APTI. Keywords Air pollution tolerance index · Ascorbic acid · Relative water content · Ozone · Suspended particulate matter · Total chlorophyll Abbreviations O 3 Ozone RWC Relative water content TC Total chlorophyll AA Ascorbic acid APTI Air Pollution Tolerance Index SPM Suspended particulate matter The ambient concentrations of primary and secondary air pollutants have recently increased in many developing countries due to rising urbanization and industrialization (Leitch et al. 2014; Liu et al. 2021). Due to this technogenic activities, a growth in the number of automobiles, use of fossil energy with bad environmental quality, poorly main- tained roads, inefficient environmental control, the air qual- ity has steadily deteriorated (Agrawal et al. 2003; Kumar et al. 2022). For the impingement, absorption, and buildup of gaseous pollutants, plants offer a vast leaf surface (Feng et al. 2019; Skinder et al. 2014). The potential of each type of plant to absorb and adsorb air contaminants through its foliar surface differs greatly. This capacity is influenced by a number of biochemical, physiological, and anatomi- cal factors (Singh et al. 2020). Evergreen plants experience physio-biochemical changes when exposed to poor air pol- lution (Priyadarshini et al. 2019). It has been demonstrated that the stomatal conductance, photosynthetic rate, and root architecture of a young plant are all influenced by ambient air pollution levels (Chaud- hary & Agrawal 2015; Lopez et al. 2021). The plant's most delicate element, the leaf, is continually exposed to the envi- ronment (Watson et al. 2021). Research studies relevant to crops have shown the negative impacts of particulate mat- ter and other air pollutants with a decline in photosynthetic and yield (Usha et al. 2021; Joshi et al. 2009). Tropospheric ozone (O 3 ) values above 40 ppb are regarded as phyto- toxic for crops among secondary air pollutants (Usha et al. 2021; Ghosh et al. 2021). Studies have shown that the Indo- Gangetic Plains (IGP) India, one of the most significant and * Manoj Chandra Garg manoj28280@gmail.com 1 Amity University Uttar Pradesh, Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India 2 Division of Environment Science, ICAR-Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi, India 3 School of Environmental Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India 4 Academy of Biology and Biotechnology, Southern Federal University, 344090 Rostov-On-Don, Russia