Fungi and plants clean up California heavy metal and petrochemical pollution
LOS ANGELES — In an industrial wasteland in Los Angeles, Kreigh Hampel is uprooting California buckwheat with a pitchfork to find out how much lead it has absorbed.The plant’s delicate white and pink flowers belie an astonishing cleaning power, which scientists think could be harnessed to get rid of dangerous pollutants — and even recycle them.“That’s the miracle of life,”