A novel bioremediation strategy for petroleum hydrocarbon pollutants using salt tolerant Corynebacterium variabile HRJ4 and biochar

The present work aimed to develop a novel strategy to bioremediate the petroleum hydrocarbon contaminants in the environment.Salt tolerant bacterium was isolated from Dagang oilfield,China and identified as Corynebacterium variabile HRJ4 based on 16 S r RNA gene sequence analysis.The bacterium had a high salt tolerant capability and biochar was developed as carrier for the bacterium.The bacteria with biochar were most effective in degradation of n-alkanes（C16,C18,C19,C26,C28） and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons（NAP,PYR） mixture.The result demonstrated that immobilization of C.variabile HRJ4 with biochar showed higher degradation of total petroleum hydrocarbons（THPs） up to 78.9%after 7-day of incubation as compared to the free leaving bacteria.The approach of this study will be helpful in clean-up of petroleum-contamination in the environments through bioremediation process using eco-friendly and cost effective materials like biochar.