Application Research Status and Development Prospect of Microbial Flocculant

Microbial flocculant （MBF） is a kind of novel flocculant, which is widely used for the food industry, highly concentrated organic waste water treatment and the urban water supply technology. Due to its characteristics of superior flocculation effect, without secondary pollution to the environment and being easily degraded, MBF has been emerging as a hotspot of water treatment research in recent years. In this paper, the latest progress of the preparation of MBFs and the flocculating mechanism were presented. The practical application research of MBFs for water treatment was reviewed. Finally, suggestions and development prospect of research on MBFs were discussed.

Experimental research on Phanerochaete chrysosporium as coal microbial flocculant

The flocculation effect of the Phanerochaete chrysosporium on the coal slurry were studied by orthogonal experimental method in this study.The results of research show that the P.chrysosporium has a good effect on flocculating coal slurry.The optimum combination of the experimental is the P.chrysosporium,which is cultured in 2 days,mixed with 2 mL coagulant and 2 mL broth.The flocculant is a broken liquid with pH value of 6.The hightest flocculation ratio is 93.5%.The result of FTIR shows that the biological extraction of P.chrysosporium contains a lot of acidic polysaccharides that has the effect on flocculation.Microbial flocculant molecules and particles of coal slurry could be flocculated by‘‘absorption bridge’’.

Screening of Bioflocculant-Producing Strains and Characteristics of Microbial Flocculation

A high effective bioflocculant-producing strain named LB1 was isolated and screened from the leachate by routine micro- method. The strain was identified as genus Pseudomonas according to the morphologic and physiological-biochemical characteristics of the strain. The biological characteristics of the microbial flocculants produced by LB1 were investigated. The results show that the optimal production period of microbial flocculant using LB1 is 96 h; and the products, found in the fermentation liquor, comprise the extracellular organic matter （EOM） of LB1 generated during LB1 growth and the secondary metabolites in the anaphase of LB1. Meanwhile, the mycelia can improve the performance of the microbial flocculants. Because heat has a greater influence on the active substance in the microbial flocculants than other factors, the activity of the flocculants decreases with increasing temperature and the time of heating. The flocculants can flocculate mud-containing and melanin-containing wastewater effectively with a flocculation ratio of 85.1% and 92.2%, respectively. The optimal heating temperature varies from 20 to 45 ℃. When flocculating the two wastewater, the flocculating activity of the flocculants is above 57.7% and 70.9%, respectively, in a wide pH range from 3 to 11.

Iron and lead ion adsorption by microbial flocculants in synthetic wastewater and their related carbonate formation

Although microbial treatments of heavy metal ions in wastewater have been studied, the removal of these metals through incorporation into carbonate minerals has rarely been reported. To investigate the removal of Fe^3＋ and Pb^2＋, two representative metals in wastewater, through the precipitation of carbonate minerals by a microbial flocculant （MBF） produced by Bacillus mucilaginosus. MBF was added to synthetic wastewater containing different Fe^3＋ and Pb^2＋ concentrations, and the extent of flocculation was analyzed. CO2 was bubbled into the mixture of MBF and Fe^3＋/Pb^2＋ to initiate the reaction. The solid substrates were analyzed via X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy and energy dispersive spectroscopy. The results showed that the removal efficiency decreased and the MBF adsorption capacity for metals increased with increasing heavy metal concentration. In the system containing MBF, metals （Fe^3＋ and Pb^2＋）, and CO2, the concentrated metals adsorbed onto the MBF combined with the dissolved CO2, resulting in oversaturation of metal carbonate minerals to form iron carbonate and lead carbonates. These results may be used in designing a method in which microbes can be utilized to combine CO2 with wastewater heavy metals to form carbonates, with the aim of mitigating environmental problems.

Screening of flocculant-producing microorganisms and flocculating activity

A strain saccharomycete STSM-1 with high flocculanting activity was isolated from activated sludge with conventional methods. The high production rate and the low cost STSM-1 medium was obtained by selecting different kinds of media, carbon source, nitrogen source and inorganic salt ion. The best flocculant-producing conditions were found by changing medium initial pH, culture temperature and ventilation flow. The best flocculating effect was obtained by changing positive ion types, density and concentration of flocculant.

The biological effect of metal ions on the granulation of aerobic granular activated sludge

As a special biofilm structure,microbial attachment is believed to play an important role in the granulation of aerobic granular activated sludge（AGAS）.This experiment was to investigate the biological effect of Ca^2＋,Mg^2＋,Cu^2＋,Fe^2＋,Zn^2＋,and K＋which are the most common ions present in biological wastewater treatment systems,on the microbial attachment of AGAS and flocculent activated sludge（FAS）,from which AGAS is always derived,in order to provide a new strategy for the rapid cultivation and stability control of AGAS.The result showed that attachment biomass of AGAS was about 300%higher than that of FAS without the addition of metal ions.Different metal ions had different effects on the process of microbial attachment.FAS and AGAS reacted differently to the metal ions as well,and in fact,AGAS was more sensitive to the metal ions.Specifically,Ca^2＋,Mg^2＋,and K＋could increase the microbial attachment ability of both AGAS and FAS under appropriate concentrations,Cu^2＋,Fe^2＋,and Zn^2＋were also beneficial to the microbial attachment of FAS at low concentrations,but Cu^2＋,Fe^2＋,and Zn^2＋greatly inhibited the attachment process of AGAS even at extremely low concentrations.In addition,the acylated homoserine lactone（AHL）-based quorum sensing system,the content of extracellular polymeric substances and the relative hydrophobicity of the sludges were greatly influenced by metal ions.As all these parameters had close relationships with the microbial attachment process,the microbial attachment may be affected by changes of these parameters.