Gel-encapsulated microorganisms used as a strategy to rapidly recover biofilters after starvation interruption

Nanyang Yang; Can Wang; Meng-Fei Han

doi:10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.110237

Gel-encapsulated microorganisms used as a strategy to rapidly recover biofilters after starvation interruption

J Environ Manage. 2020 May 1:261:110237. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.110237. Epub 2020 Mar 2.

Authors

Nanyang Yang¹, Can Wang², Meng-Fei Han³

Affiliations

¹ School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin, 300072, China; Tianjin Key Lab of Indoor Air Environmental Quality Control, China. Electronic address: ynytju@163.com.
² School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin, 300072, China; Tianjin Key Lab of Indoor Air Environmental Quality Control, China. Electronic address: wangcan@tju.edu.cn.
³ School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Tianjin University, Tianjin, 300072, China; Tianjin Key Lab of Indoor Air Environmental Quality Control, China. Electronic address: hanmengfei@tju.edu.com.

PMID: 32148307
DOI: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2020.110237

Abstract

Biosystems used for volatile organic compound (VOC) control have slow re-acclimation after extended starvation. In this study, a gel-encapsuled microorganism biofilter (GEBF) for the treatment of VOCs was used for rapid recovery after starvation interruption. Another conventional perlite biofilter (BF) was used as a control. Results showed that GEBF and BF needed 3 and 6 days for fully recovery after short-term (6 days) starvation. For long-term (20 days) starvation, GEBF fully recovered the removal performance after 9 days, whereas BF recovered only 70% within the same period. Flow cytometry analysis indicated that GEBF presented better viability state of microbial population than that in BF under starvation. The average metabolic activity of microorganisms in GEBF remained a relatively high during and after starvation (0.0049 h^-1). However, the average metabolic activity of microorganisms in BF decreased from 0.0042 h^-1 before starvation to 0.0033 h^-1 under starvation. Changes in the microbial community structure in GEBF and BF were investigated and compared by high-throughput sequencing and principal component analysis. Notably, the microbial community structure in the two biofilters showed different behavior. All these results demonstrated that the gel encapsulation of microorganisms is a promising strategy to resist starvation in biofiltration technologies.

Keywords: Biofilter; Gel capsules; Microbial activities; Recovery; Starvation; VOCs.

MeSH terms

Air Pollutants*
Biodegradation, Environmental
Filtration*

Substances

Air Pollutants