Effects of biofilms on the retention and transport of PFOA in saturated porous media

Abstract

Understanding the fate and transport of perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) in soil and groundwater is essential to reliable assessments of its risks. This study investigated the impacts of Gram-positive Bacillus subtilis (BS), Gram-negative Pseudomonas aeruginosa (PA) and wild microbiota (WM) biofilm on the transport of PFOA in saturated sand columns at two ionic strengths (i.e., 1.0 and 20.0 mM NaCl). The retention of PFOA in biofilm-coated sand columns was higher than that in uncoated sand columns, due to biofilm-induced reinforced hydrophobic interactions and surface roughness, and decreased zeta potential. However, the retention effects varied among biofilm bacterial species with PFOA retardation factors in PA, WM and BS columns of 1.29-1.38, 1.21-1.29 and 1.11-1.15, respectively. Notably, PA biofilm had the most pronounced effect on PFOA retention. While increasing ionic strength promoted the retention of PFOA in BS biofilm-coated sand, it had no significant impact on PFOA transport in PA and WM biofilm-coated sand. This could be attributed to the differences in biofilm composition, deviating the ionic strengths effects on electrostatic double layer compression. The advection dispersion equation coupled with two-site kinetic retention model well described the transport of PFOA in all saturated columns. Our findings reveal that biofilm plays important roles in PFOA transport in porous media, instructive for risk assessment and remediation of PFOA contamination.

Keywords: Biofilm; Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA); Saturated porous media; Transport.