A Novel Methylotrophic Bacterial Consortium for Treatment of Industrial Effluents.

Considering the importance of methylotrophs in industrial wastewater treatment, focus of the present study was on utilization of a methylotrophic bacterial consortium as a microbial seed for biotreatment of a variety of industrial effluents. For this purpose, a mixed bacterial methylotrophic AC (Ankleshwar CETP) consortium comprising of Bordetella petrii AC1, Bacillus licheniformis AC4, Salmonella subterranea AC5, and Pseudomonas stutzeri AC8 was used. The AC consortium showed efficient biotreatment of four industrial effluents procured from fertilizer, chemical and pesticide industries, and common effluent treatment plant by lowering their chemical oxygen demand (COD) of 950-2000 mg/l to below detection limit in 60-96 h in 6-l batch reactor and 9-15 days in 6-l continuous reactor.

Occurrence of Biosurfactant Producing Bacillus spp. in Diverse Habitats.

Diversity among biosurfactant producing Bacillus spp. from diverse habitats was studied among 77 isolates. Cluster analysis based on phenotypic characteristics using unweighted pair-group method with arithmetic averages (UPGMAs) method was performed.

Selective plugging strategy-based microbial-enhanced oil recovery using Bacillus licheniformis TT33.

The selective plugging strategy of microbial enhanced oil recovery involves the use of microbes that grow and produce exopolymeric substances, which block the high permeability zones of an oil reservoir, thus allowing the water to flow through the low permeability zones leading to increase in oil recovery. Bacillus licheniformis TT33, a hot water spring isolate, is facultatively anaerobic, halotolerant, and thermotolerant. It produces EPS as well as biosurfactant and has a biofilm-forming ability.

Evaluation of bioemulsifier mediated Microbial Enhanced Oil Recovery using sand pack column.

Bacillus licheniformis K125, isolated from an oil reservoir, produces an effective bioemulsifier. The crude bioemulsifier showed 66% emulsification activity (E(24)) and reduced the surface tension of water from 72 to 34 mN/m. It contains substantial amount of polysaccharide, protein and lipid.