Phytoremediation Potential of Eichhornia crassipes (Mart.) Solms Upma Narang*, Renu Bhardwaj*, S.K.Garg**, A.K.Thukral* (upma_res1@yahoo.com;akthukral@rediffmail.com;renu_bhardwaj@rediffmail.com) *Department of Botanical & Environmental Sciences **Department of Molecular Biology & Biochemistry Guru Nanak Dev University, Amritsar- 143005, India ABSTRACT The heavy metals are serious environmental pollutants especially in areas of high anthropogenic pressure. Unlike organicals that can be mineralized, heavy metals must either be physically removed or converted to a biologically inert form. Phytoremediation – the use of plants for pollution abatement offers an innovative green clean technology. Aquatic macrophyte based water treatment systems (AMS) offer a low energy consuming and low-cost method for removing contaminants from polluted waters. Eichhornia crassipes (Mart.) Solms is well known for its amazing ability to absorb and concentrate heavy metals such as cadmium, copper, lead, mercury and europium etc. in aquatic systems. The present paper reviews the phytoremediating potential of E. crassipes. Key words – E. crassipes, heavy metals, phytoremediation, wastewater treatment, metal detoxification. Introduction Heavy metals like Cd, Cu, Pb, Cr and Hg pose a major occupational and environmental hazard as they are non-biodegradable with a very long biological half- life (Barbier et al., 2005). Heavy metals are toxic to living organisms when taken in excess. However, a subset of these at low concentrations, are essential micronutrients. It is exceedingly difficult to make a clear distinction between essential and toxic metallic elements, as all metals are probably toxic if ingested in sufficiently large doses. Non-essential heavy metals such as arsenic, antimony, cadmium, chromium, 1