A Chinese research team recently proposed the novel idea that the ground beneath our feet could clean itself.

A process called microbial iron mining utilizes microbes that can “breathe” iron. As they do, they switch iron back and forth between its rusty and shiny forms — like a little chemical frolic that captures and modifies pollutants.

The tiny miners can tackle toxic metals like arsenic and lead, chemicals like pesticides and microplastics and excess antibiotics and nutrients that typically pollute waterways.

Most notable is that the soil cleaning is natural. Rather than having to dig up and haul away contaminated soil, scientists can provoke these microbes to do the work while saving energy, protecting ecosystems and recovering valuable resources like rare earth elements.

It’s still early days and the research is still lab based, but it shows promise. The next steps are deciphering how this will work in real-world soil while managing side effects like greenhouse-gas releases.

The research demonstrates how powerful nature can be under the right conditions and was published in Environmental and Biogeochemical Processes.

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