Continuous treatment of non-sterile hospital wastewater by Trametes versicolor

Hospital wastewaters have a high load of pharmaceutical active compounds (PhACs). Fungal treatments could be appropriate for source treatment of such effluents but the transition to non-sterile conditions proved to be difficult due to competition with indigenous microorganisms, resulting in very sho...

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Bibliographic Details
Authors: Mir Tutusaus, Josep Anton|||0000-0002-0581-2556, Caminal i Saperas, Glòria|||0000-0001-9646-6099, Sarrà, Montserrat|||0000-0002-3447-6328
Format: article
Publication Date:2016
Country:España
Institution:Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
Repository:Dipòsit Digital de Documents de la UAB
Language:English
OAI Identifier:oai:ddd.uab.cat:163018
Online Access:https://ddd.uab.cat/record/163018
https://dx.doi.org/urn:doi:10.1016/j.jhazmat.2016.07.036
Access Level:Open access
Keyword:Fungal bioreactor
Hospital wastewater
Non-sterile
Pharmaceutical active compounds
Pretreatment
Description
Summary:Hospital wastewaters have a high load of pharmaceutical active compounds (PhACs). Fungal treatments could be appropriate for source treatment of such effluents but the transition to non-sterile conditions proved to be difficult due to competition with indigenous microorganisms, resulting in very short-duration operations. In this article, coagulation-flocculation and UV-radiation processes were studied as pretreatments to a fungal reactor treating non-sterile hospital wastewater in sequential batch operation and continuous operation modes. The influent was spiked with ibuprofen and ketoprofen, and both compounds were successfully degraded by over 80%. UV pretreatment did not extent the fungal activity after coagulation-flocculation measured as laccase production and pellet integrity. Sequential batch operation did not reduce bacteria competition during fungal treatment. The best strategy was the addition of a coagulation-flocculation pretreatment to a continuous reactor, which led to an operation of 28days without biomass renovation.