Potential of combined fungal and bacterial treatment for color removal in textile wastewater
Introduction
Synthetic dyes are important organo-pollutants contaminating the water environment, often due to a massive release from the textile dyeing process into the effluents. Besides potential hazardous effects of dyes (Smith, 1996, Novotný et al., 2006, Malachová et al., 2006), very low concentrations of these pollutants negatively affect aesthetic value of stream waters, reducing also the amount of light entering in the water with an adverse effect on photosynthesizing organisms. The efficiency of decolorization of synthetic dyes by mixed bacterial communities in municipal aerobic treatment systems is rather poor, except for some dyes (Lee et al., 2006, Brik et al., 2006); toxic dyes may even cause inhibition of the bacterial activity (Georgiou et al., 2002). The removal of dyes and other organo-pollutants by bacterial communities often results from adsorption (Adedayo et al., 2004) which leads to concentration of recalcitrant aromatic toxicants in the sludge. The levels of these compounds in the sludge can be decreased by degradation by filamentous fungi including white-rot fungi (More et al., 2010).
Dye decolorization under anaerobic conditions followed by aerobic treatment degrading the products of anaerobic cleavage (Van der Zee and Villaverde, 2005, Lee et al., 2006) is an option, however, in the case of azo dyes, carcinogenic aromatic amines are produced in the anaerobic step (Chung and Cerniglia, 1992) and their complete removal in the subsequent aerobic treatment is difficult (Van der Zee and Villaverde, 2005, Mohanty et al., 2006). Another problem is a possible re-colorization of anaerobic degradation products upon exposure to oxygen and the inhibition of methanogenic activity development (Lee et al., 2006). Similar to the anaerobic–aerobic sequence, the aerobic activated sludge treatment can be coupled with various physical and chemical pre-treatments including adsorption, oxidation, reduction and advanced oxidation processes (Dubrow et al., 1996). An alternative investigated in this study is dye decolorization carried out by relatively unspecific fungal oxidative enzymes leading to both decolorization and detoxification in the first step (cf. Singh, 2006) with a subsequent degradation of the degradation products by bacterial communities in the second step.
White-rot basidiomycetes have been widely studied for their ability to degrade recalcitrant organo-pollutants including synthetic dyes and this ability has been well documented (e.g. Fu and Viraraghavan, 2001, Singh, 2006, Reddy and Mathew, 2008). However, relatively few fungal species have so far been investigated (e.g. Wesenberg et al., 2003, Singh, 2006). Major biodegradation mechanism involves ligninolytic enzymes (e.g. Heinfling et al., 1998, Svobodová et al., 2008), the relative contribution of lignin peroxidase (LiP) manganese-dependent peroxidase (MnP) and laccase can be different in various fungal organisms and, often, the correlation between the enzyme activities and decolorization rates is difficult to establish (Fu and Viraraghavan, 2001, Mielgo et al., 2002, Kasinath et al., 2003). Fungal dye biodegradation results in efficient cleavage of the dye molecule and detoxification of the initial dye compound (e.g. Spadaro and Renganathan, 1994, Svobodová et al., 2007, Malachová et al., 2006).
White-rot fungi have been used for dye decolorization in different types of reactors, such as packed-bed-, fluidized bed-, and rotating disc- bioreactors (Zhang et al., 1999, Mielgo et al., 2002, Kapdan and Kargi, 2002, Kasinath et al., 2003). Grown under solid-state conditions where, favorably, cheap plastic materials or wood- and agro-industrial wastes can be used as the support-substrate, these fungi can be applied in the form of biofilters to remediation of polluted water including colored textile effluents. Trametes hirsuta immobilized on orange peel was able to attain high decolorization rates between 80% and 100% for indigoid-, triphenyl methane- and azo dyes applied at tens to hundreds mg l−1 when the bioreactors were used in batch and continuous mode (Rodriguez Couto et al., 2006). Both T. hirsuta and Phanerochaete chrysosporium, immobilized on orange peel and polyurethane foam, respectively, decolorized polymeric anthraquinone dye Poly R-478 used at 180 and 100 mg l−1 by 50–80% under optimal conditions (Mielgo et al., 2002, Rodriguez Couto et al., 2006). Unidentified fungal strain F29 used in packed-bed- and fluidized-bed bioreactors for decolorization of the azo dye Orange II applied at 1 g l−1 showed a high dye removal efficiency exceeding 97% in 24 h when the fungus was immobilized in 2% W/V sodium alginate. The free mycelial pellets and immobilized fungal mycelium could be reused for more than 1 and 2 months, respectively, at a high efficiency (Zhang et al., 1999).
However, for the establishment of a practical treatment process of textile effluents, several problems have to be overcome. Maintaining fungal growth under non-sterile operation of bioreactors represent important limitations of long-term biodegradative processes in immobilized fungal cultures that have to be overcome (Zhang et al., 1999, Borchert and Libra, 2001, Mielgo et al., 2002). Moreover, despite the fact that the fungal process of decolorization of synthetic dyes has been broadly studied, little attention has been paid to the possibility of its cooperation with the traditional biological wastewater treatment technology (Miyata et al., 2000). In this context, the use of immobilized reactor systems where the growth conditions for the different types of organisms can be established individually seem to be of specific advantage.
The aim of the study was to investigate the degradation potential of the preselected white-rot fungus I. lacteus immobilized on polyurethane foam/straw carrier in a trickling filter reactor to decolorize chemically different, model textile dyes and textile dyehouse wastewaters and to prove its applicability in sequential use with a mixed bacterial consortium for decolorization of recalcitrant dyes and textile wastewater and for total organic carbon (TOC) removal. The fungal decolorization capacities were demonstrated and the fungal trickling filters characterized by measuring the levels of extracellular enzymes involved in dye degradation. The dye- and TOC removal shares of the fungus and mixed bacterial cultures during the sequential use of both cultures were determined.
Section snippets
Microorganism
Irpex lacteus Fr. 238 617/93 deposited in the Culture Collection of Basidiomycetes of the Institute of Microbiology of the ASCR, Prague was used. The strain was selected from 39 strains of ligninolytic fungi by proving its biodegradation potential on solid and liquid media with the polymeric dye Poly R-478 and various textile dyes (Novotný et al., 2003, Novotný et al., 2009). Its robust growth in the presence of dyes (Novotný et al., 2004), the capability to colonize efficiently various inert
Results and discussion
Considering the low efficiency of conventional biological treatment processes to remove dyes from contaminated water, the main purpose of our study was to investigate the possibility of coupling the dye degradation potential of a strain of ligninolytic fungi with high degradation characteristics and tolerance to bacterial stress with a traditional bacterial aerobic process which is efficient in the removal of organics for bioremediation of textile wastewaters.
The experimental scheme used in the
Conclusions
The efficiency of a sequential biodegradation process using fungal- and mixed bacterial cultures for treatment of textile wastewaters was demonstrated. In this two-step approach the fungal step provides the decolorization and the bacterial step the removal of organic carbon pollution from the effluents. I. lacteus formed sustainable biofilms usable for long periods and was capable of rapid decolorization of various dye structures. It maintained effective levels of MnP and laccase during
Acknowledgements
The work was supported by the Czech projects IAAX00200901 (Grant Agency of the Academy of Sciences), LC 06066 (Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport CR), and Institutional Research Concept No. AV0Z50200510 as well as by the Czech-Austrian science co-operation programme “Kontakt” (Austrian Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Culture/Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport CR), project No. 2003/14.
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