Cadmium removal from contaminated soil by thermally responsive elastin (ELPEC20) biopolymers.

Cadmium contamination of soil is a major concern in the biosphere. Beyond the suite of available physico-chemical treatment methods, green and more efficient technologies are desired to reduce cadmium and other heavy metal contaminants to acceptable levels. Elastin-like polypeptides (ELP) composed of a polyhistidine domain (ELPH12) can be used as an environmentally benign chelating agent for ex situ soil washing. However, ELPH12 is relatively non-selective. A biopolymer with metal-binding domains that have stronger affinity, capacity, and selectivity would have distinct advantages. The aim of this work is to investigate the use of a new generation of ELP biopolymer, ELPEC20, containing synthetic phytochelatin (EC) as the metal-binding domain for ex situ soil washing. ELPEC20 was shown to bind cadmium more effectively and selectively than ELPH12. The binding constant of ELPEC20 is an order of magnitude higher and the binding capacity is fivefold higher than ELPH12. In contrast to ELPH12, no decrease in cadmium binding was observed in the presence of other competing metal ions. The improved selectivity and binding capacity provided by ELPEC20 were directly reflected in the enhanced cadmium extraction efficiency from contaminated soil. In batch washing studies up to 62% of the bound cadmium was removed by ELPEC20 while less than 12% was removed by ELPH12. Cadmium was removed not only from the exchangeable fraction but also the oxidizable fraction. The high-affinity binding sites of ELPEC20 also results in very rapid extraction with complete removal achieved within 1 h, suggesting that ELPEC20 could be used as part of a rapid (short retention time) technology with minimum possibility for the biodegradation of biopolymers.

Perchlorate reduction by autotrophic bacteria attached to zerovalent iron in a flow-through reactor.

Biological reduction of perchlorate by autotrophic microorganisms attached to zerovalent iron (ZVI) was studied in flow-through columns. The effects of pH, flow rate, and influent perchlorate and nitrate concentrations on perchlorate reduction were investigated. Excellent perchlorate removal performance (> or = 99%) was achieved at empty bed residence times (EBRTs) ranging from 0.3 to 63 h and an influent perchlorate concentration of 40-600 microg L(-1). At the longest liquid residence times, when the influent pH was above 7.5, a significant increase of the effluent pH was observed (pH > 10.0), which led to a decrease of perchlorate removal. Experiments at short residence times revealed that the ZVI column inoculated with local soil (Colton, CA) containing a mixed culture of denitrifiers exhibited much better performance than the columns inoculated with Dechloromonas sp. HZ for reduction of both perchlorate and nitrate. As the flow rate was varied between 2 and 50 mL min(-1), corresponding to empty bed contact times of 0.15-3.8 h, a maximum perchlorate elimination capacity of 3.0 +/- 0.7 g m(-3) h(-1) was obtained in a soil-inoculated column. At an EBRT of 0.3 h and an influent perchlorate concentration of 30 microg L(-1), breakthrough (> 6 ppb) of perchlorate in the effluent did not occur until the nitrate concentration in the influent was 1500 times (molar) greater than that of perchlorate. The mass of microorganisms attached on the solid ZVI/sand was found to be 3 orders of magnitude greater than that in the pore liquid, indicating that perchlorate was primarily reduced by bacteria attached to ZVI. Overall, the process appears to be a promising alternative for perchlorate remediation.

Perchlorate reduction by autotrophic bacteria in the presence of zero-valent iron.

A series of batch experiments were performed to study the combination of zero-valent iron (ZVI) with perchlorate-reducing microorganisms (PRMs) to remove perchlorate from groundwater. In this method, H2 produced during the process of iron corrosion by water is used by PRMs as an electron donor to reduce perchlorate to chloride. Perchlorate degradation rates followed Monod kinetics, with a normalized maximum utilization rate (rmax) of 9200 microg g(-1) (dry wt) h(-1) and a half-velocity constant (Ks) of 8900 microg L(-1). The overall rate of perchlorate reduction was affected by the biomass density within the system. An increase in the OD600 from 0.025 to 0.08 led to a corresponding 4-fold increase of perchlorate reduction rate. PRM adaptation to the local environment and initiation of perchlorate reduction was rapid under neutral pH conditions. At the initial OD600 of 0.015, perchlorate reduction followed pseudo-first-order reaction rates with constants of 0.059 and 0.033 h(-1) at initial pH 7 and 8, respectively. Once perchlorate reduction was established, the bioreductive process was insensitive to the increases of pH from near neutral to 9.0. In the presence of nitrate, perchlorate reduction rate was reduced, but not inhibited completely.

A kinetic model for suspended and attached growth of a defined mixed culture.

Kinetic experiments were carried out in a semicontinuous wastewater treatment process called self-cycling fermentation (SCF) using a defined mixed culture and various concentrations of synthetic brewery wastewater. The same consortium, which had been previously identified as Acinetobacter sp., Enterobacter sp., and Candida sp., were used in these experiments. The overall rate of substrate removal was attributable to both suspended microbes and the biofilm that formed during the treatment process. A rate expression was developed for the SCF system for a range of synthetic wastewaters containing glucose and various initial concentrations of ethanol and maltose. The data indicated that substrate removal by the suspended cells was directly related to the biomass concentration. However, substrate removal by the biofilm was apparently not affected by the biofilm thickness and was a function of substrate concentration only.

Comparison of PCR-DGGE and selective plating methods for monitoring the dynamics of a mixed culture population in synthetic brewery wastewater.

Enrichment of an activated sludge inoculum in synthetic brewery wastewater, which included glucose, maltose, and ethanol, was conducted in batch experiments to identify the dominant microbes present, to determine methodologies capable of monitoring the mixed culture population dynamics, and to determine the consortium's substrate degradation behavior. These results and methodologies were subsequently used in the determination of the population dynamics of suspended and attached microorganisms in a sequencing batch system in the second part of this research work. The three-membered microbial community comprised two bacterial and one fungal species that were identified as Acinetobacter sp., Enterobacter sp., and Candida sp. PCR-DGGE and plating on selective media were used to track the population dynamics of the consortium during the degradation of different substrates in synthetic wastewater containing glucose, maltose, and ethanol. Enterobacter sp. could degrade glucose and maltose but not ethanol, whereas Acinetobacter and Candida could degrade all three carbon sources. In buffered batch mixed culture experiments, Enterobacter was the predominant bacterium until the sugar concentrations decreased to levels that enabled Acinetobacter and Candida to degrade ethanol. PCR-DGGE was effective for detecting the dominant species, but culture-based methods were more accurate for monitoring the population dynamics of these microorganisms during growth in the wastewater medium.