Microalgae: A Biological Tool for Removal and Recovery of Potentially Toxic Elements in Wastewater Treatment Photobioreactors.

Potentially toxic elements (PTE) pollution in water bodies is an emerging problem in recent decades due to uncontrolled discharges from human activities. Copper, zinc, arsenic, cadmium, lead, mercury, and uranium are considered potentially toxic and carcinogenic elements that threaten human health. Microalgae-based technologies for the wastewater treatment have gained importance in recent years due to their biomass high growth rates and effectiveness.

Optimisation of the production of fermentable monosaccharides from algal biomass grown in photobioreactors treating wastewater.

Biomass grown in wastewater treatment photobioreactors is a cheap raw material with high contents of carbohydrates, proteins and lipids. This work studies the production of fermentable monosaccharides from three biomasses grown in piggery wastewater (P), domestic wastewater (W) and synthetic medium (S) by applying chemical pretreatment and enzymatic hydrolysis, using a Taguchi design. ANOVA identified temperature, chemical reagent type and chemical reagent concentration as significant operational parameters.

Recovery of proteins from biomass grown in pig manure microalgae-based treatment plants by alkaline hydrolysis and acidic precipitation.

The influence of three variables on key parameters of the protein extraction process (an alkaline hydrolysis followed by an acidic precipitation) for biomass from innovative photo-bioreactors for pig manure treatment was evaluated. Alkaline hydrolysis provided high solubilisation values (up to 66.5% of the biomass), augmenting with increasing values of the three studied variables (NaOH concentration, temperature and time).

Characterization of regional cold-hydrothermal inflows enriched in arsenic and associated trace-elements in the southern part of the Duero Basin (Spain), by multivariate statistical analysis.

Naturally occurring arsenic in groundwater exceeding the limit for potability has been reported along the southern edge of the Cenozoic Duero Basin (CDB) near its contact with the Spanish Central System (SCS). In this area, spatial variability of arsenic is high, peaking at 241μg/L. Forty-seven percent of samples collected contained arsenic above the maximum allowable concentration for drinking water (10μg/L).

Arsenic, barium, strontium and uranium geochemistry and their utility as tracers to characterize groundwaters from the Espadán-Calderona Triassic Domain, Spain.

A set of analytical data from the Espadán-Calderona Triassic Domain aquifers was processed using hierarchical agglomerative cluster analysis (HCA) and principal component analysis (PCA), to achieve a quantitative and independent approach to investigate the characteristics of groundwater composition and possible differences between groundwater flows from Triassic aquifers from the Espadán-Calderona Triassic Domain (Spain). Mineralization in the Triassic series has led to the presence of several metals and metalloids in groundwater, including As, Mn, Fe and U. These are associated with fresher bicarbonate groundwaters, characterized by lower Sr/Ba ratios.