Abstract
The genotoxicity of wastewater samples was investigated using Allium cepa assay. Wastewater samples were taken from marble cutting factory, cloth dying factory, cooking oil industry and residential kitchen from Karachi, Pakistan. Onion root tips were treated with different concentrations (10, 50 and 100%) of industrial and kitchen wastewater. Three slides per treatment and concentrations were prepared. It was noticed that mitotic index decreased by increasing the concentration of wastewater. The results also showed that wastewater treatments produced various types of chromosomal aberrations, where stickiness was most frequently occurring aberration. It was also observed that effect of marble and kitchen wastewater was drastic, as most of the cells were ruptured at 100% concentration. Frequency of aberrations was different in different samples.
