Polyhydroxyalkanoates production from ethanol- and lactate-rich fermentate of confectionary industry effluents.

Polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) production has been the focus of considerable research to increase productivities and reduce production costs. In this study, a fermented confectionary industry wastewater was used as feedstock for mixed microbial culture PHA production. The feedstock was dominated by lactate and ethanol (60-90 % of all soluble fermentation products).

Marine-Derived Actinomycetes: Biodegradation of Plastics and Formation of PHA Bioplastics-A Circular Bioeconomy Approach.

Plastics are present in the majority of daily-use products worldwide. Due to society's production and consumption patterns, plastics are accumulating in the environment, causing global pollution issues and intergenerational impacts. Our work aims to contribute to the development of solutions and sustainable methods to mitigate this pressing problem, focusing on the ability of marine-derived actinomycetes to accelerate plastics biodegradation and produce polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs), which are biodegradable bioplastics.

Polyhydroxyalkanoates from a Mixed Microbial Culture: Extraction Optimization and Polymer Characterization.

Polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHA) are biopolymers with potential to replace conventional oil-based plastics. However, PHA high production costs limit their scope of commercial applications. Downstream processing is currently the major cost factor for PHA production but one of the least investigated aspects of the PHA production chain.

Oerskovia paurometabola can efficiently decolorize azo dye Acid Red 14 and remove its recalcitrant metabolite.

The biodegradation of dyes remains one of the biggest challenges of textile wastewater. Azo dyes are one of the most commonly employed dye classes, and biological treatment processes tend to generate recalcitrant aromatic amines, which are more toxic than the parent dye molecule. This study aimed to isolate bacterial strains with the capacity to degrade both the azo dye and the resulting aromatic amines towards the development of a simple and reliable treatment approach for dye-laden wastewaters.

Stability of aerobic granules during long-term bioreactor operation.

Aerobic granular sludge technology has been extensively studied over the past 20 years and is regarded as the upcoming new standard for biological treatment of domestic and industrial wastewaters. Aerobic granules (AG) are dense, compact, self-immobilized microbial aggregates that allow better sludge-water separation and thereby higher biomass concentrations in the bioreactor than conventional activated sludge aggregates. This brings potential practical advantages in terms of investment cost, energy consumption and footprint.

Calibration Transfer Between a Bench Scanning and a Submersible Diode Array Spectrophotometer for In Situ Wastewater Quality Monitoring in Sewer Systems.

Online monitoring programs based on spectroscopy have a high application potential for the detection of hazardous wastewater discharges in sewer systems. Wastewater hydraulics poses a challenge for in situ spectroscopy, especially when the system includes storm water connections leading to rapid changes in water depth, velocity, and in the water quality matrix. Thus, there is a need to optimize and fix the location of in situ instruments, limiting their availability for calibration.

Effect of an azo dye on the performance of an aerobic granular sludge sequencing batch reactor treating a simulated textile wastewater.

This study analyzed the effect of an azo dye (Acid Red 14) on the performance of an aerobic granular sludge (AGS) sequencing batch reactor (SBR) system operated with 6-h anaerobic-aerobic cycles for the treatment of a synthetic textile wastewater. In this sense, two SBRs inoculated with AGS from a domestic wastewater treatment plant were run in parallel, being one supplied with the dye and the other used as a dye-free control. The AGS successfully adapted to the new hydrodynamic conditions forming smaller, denser granules in both reactors, with optimal sludge volume index values of 19 and 17 mL g(-1) after 5-min and 30-min settling, respectively.

Use of spectra in the visible and near-mid-ultraviolet range with principal component analysis and partial least squares processing for monitoring of suspended solids in municipal wastewater treatment plants.

The present work assesses the possibility of using spectrophotometry in the near-mid-ultraviolet and visible wavelength ranges (282-790 nm) for the direct monitoring of treatment performance in municipal wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). Principal component analysis (PCA) was used to analyze spectral data from samples collected along three WWTP process lines with different primary and secondary treatment units. The clustering observed in PCA score plots was mainly attributed to the suspended solids fraction present in the wastewater and highlighted differences in solids quality between plants and along the treatment lines.

Kinetic studies of reactive azo dye decolorization in anaerobic/aerobic sequencing batch reactors.

The decolorization kinetics of Remazol Brilliant Violet 5R (RBV-5R) and Remazol Black B (RB-B) (mono- and diazo reactive dyes, respectively) was investigated in the first 9 h (anaerobic phase) of a 24-h cycle anaerobic/aerobic sequencing batch reactor (SBR). Two distinct, successive decolorization periods were observed for both dyes, apparently due to different decolorization mechanisms. The apparent first-order rate constants were much lower for the second periods.