• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.35-45
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• 2023

Biofilms significantly affect the performance of wastewater treatment processes in which biodegradability of numerous microorganisms are actively involved, and various technologies have been applied to secure microbial biofilms. Understanding changes in biofilm characteristics by regulating expression of signaling molecules is important to control and regulate biofilms in membrane bioreactor, i.e., biofouling. This study investigated effects of addition of acyl-homoserine lactones (AHL) as a controllable factor for the microbial signaling system on biofilm formation of Pseudomonas aeruginosa PAO1 and multiple strains in membrane bioreactor. The addition of three AHL, i.e., C4-, C6-, and C8-HSL, at a concentration of 200 ㎍/L, enhanced the formation of the PAO1 biofilm and the degree of increases in the biofilm formation of PAO1 were 70.2%, 76.6%, and 72.9%, respectively. The improvement of biofilm formation of individual strains by C4-HSL was an average of 68%, and the microbial consortia increased by approximately 52.1% in the presence of 200 ㎍/L C4-HSL. CLSM images showed that more bacterial cells were present on the membrane surface after the AHL application. In the COMSTAT results, biomass and thickness were increased up to 2.2 times (PAO1) and 1.6 times (multi-strains) by C4-HSL. This study clearly showed that biofilm formation was increased by the application of AHL to individual strain groups, including PAO1 and microbial consortia, and significant increases were observed when 50 or 100 ㎍/L AHL was administered. This suggests that AHL application can improve the biofilm formation of microorganisms, which could yield an enhancement in efficiency of biofilm control, such as in various biofilm reactors including membrane bioreactor and bioflocculent systems in water/wastewater treatment processes.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.607-613
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• 2001

The biodegradation rates of diesel oil by a selected diesel-degrading bacterium, Pseudomonas stutzeri strain Y2G1, and microbial consortia composed of combinations of 5 selected diesel-degrading bacterial were determined in liquid and soil systems. The diesel degradation rate by strain Y2G1 linearly increased $(R^2=0.98)$ as the diesel concentration increased up to 12%, and a degradation rate as high as 5.64 g/l/day was obtained. The diesel degradation by strain Y2G1 was significantly affected by several environmental factors, and the optimal conditions for pH, temperature, and moisture content were at pH8, $25^{\circ}C$, and 10%, respectively. In the batch soil microcosm tests, inoculation, especially in the form of a consortium, and the addition of nutrients both significantly enhanced the diesel degradation by a factor of 1.5 and 4, respectively. Aeration of the soil columns effectively accelerated the diesel degradation, and the initial degradation rate was obviously stimulated with the addition of inorganic nutrients. Based on these results, it was concluded that the major rate-limiting factors in the tested diesel-contaminated soil were the presence of inorganic nutrients, oxygen, and diesel-degrading microorganisms. To resolve these limiting parameters, bioremediation strategies were specifically designed for the tested soil, and the successful mitigation of the limiting parameters resulted in an enhancement of the bioremediation efficiency by a factor of 11.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.515-521
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• 2004

Anaerobic digestion has many advantages over the more conventional aerobic treatment processes such as low levels of excess sludge production, low space (area) requirements, and the production of valuable biogas. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of organic loading rate of anaerobic digestion on thermophilic($55^{\circ}C$) and mesophilic($35^{\circ}C$) conditions. Fluorescent in situ hybridization (FISH) method was also used to study the microbial community in the reactors. The stabilizing time in mesophilic anaerobic reactors was shorter as approximately 20 days than 40 days in the thermophilic anaerobic reactors. The amount of methane production rate in anaerobic reactors was independent of the concentrations of supplied substrates and the amount of methanogens. When the microbial diversity in the mesophilic and thermophilic reactors, which had been treated with acetate-based artificial wastewater, were compared, it was found that methanogenesis was carried out by microbial consortia consisting of bacteria and archaea such as methanogens. To investigate the activity of bacterial and archaeal populations in all anaerobic reactors, the amount of acetate was measured. Archaea were predominant in all reactors. Interestingly, Methanothrix-like methanogens appeared in mesophilic anaerobic reactors with high feed substrate concentrations, whereas it was not observed in thermophilic anaerobic reactors.

• Microbiology and Biotechnology Letters
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• v.50 no.1
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• pp.110-121
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• 2022

The effluents from industries processing vegetable oils are extremely rich in sulfates, often exceeding the maximum concentration allowed to release them to the environment. Biological sulfate reduction is a promising alternative for the removal of sulfates in this type of wastewater, which has other particularities such as an acidic pH. The ability to reduce sulfates has been widely described for a particular bacterial group (SRB: sulfate-reducing bacteria), although the reports describing its application for the treatment of sulfate-rich industrial wastewaters are scarce. In this work, we describe the use of a natural SRB-based consortium able to remove above 30% of sulfates in the wastewater from one of the largest edible oil industries in Peru. Metataxonomic analysis was used to analyse the interdependencies established between SRB and the native microbiota present in the wastewater samples, and the performance of the consortium was quantified for different sulfate concentrations in laboratory-scale reactors. Our results pave the way towards the use of this consortium as a low-cost, sustainable alternative for the treatment of larger volumes of wastewater coming from this type of industries.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.33 no.3
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• pp.348-355
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• 2023

Epifluorescence microscopy with image analysis was evaluated as a biofilm quantification method (i.e., quantification of surface area colonized by biofilms), in comparison with crystal violet (CV) staining. We performed different experiments to generate multispecies biofilms with natural and artificial bacterial assemblages. First, four species were inoculated daily in 16 different sequences to form biofilms (surface colonization, 0.1%-56.6%). Second, a 9-species assemblage was allowed to form biofilms under 10 acylase treatment episodes (33.8%-55.6%). The two methods comparably measured the quantitative variation in biofilms, exhibiting a strong positive relationship (R² ≥ 0.7). Moreover, the two methods exhibited similar levels of variation coefficients. Finally, six synthetic and two natural consortia were allowed to form biofilms for 14 days, and their temporal dynamics were monitored. The two methods were comparable in quantifying four biofilms colonizing ≥18.7% (R² ≥ 0.64), but not for the other biofilms colonizing ≤ 3.7% (R² ≤ 0.25). In addition, the two methods exhibited comparable coefficients of variation in the four biofilms. Microscopy and CV staining comparably measured the quantitative variation of biofilms, exhibiting a strongly positive relationship, although microscopy cannot appropriately quantify the biofilms below the threshold colonization. Microscopy with image analysis is a promising approach for easily and rapidly estimating absolute quantity of multispecies biofilms.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.41 no.3
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• pp.208-215
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• 2005

This study was accomplished in order to collect fundamental data on microbial roles in recycling process of reed rhizosphere. Sunchon bay, which is considered as one of the marsh and mud environments severely affected by human activities such agriculture and fisheries, was selected as a model place. In our initial efforts, two bacterial consortia were obtained by enrichment culture using PAH mixtures containing anthracene, naphthalene, phenanthrene and pyrene as the sources of carbon and energy, and four pure bacteria capable of rapid degradation of PAH were isolated from them. Four strains designated as SCB1, SCB2, SCB6, and SCB7 revealed by morphological, physiological and molecular analyses were identified as Burkholderia anthina, Alcaligenes sp., Achromobacter xylosoxidans., and Pseudomonas putida, respectively with over $99{\%}$ confidence. Notably, Burkholderia anthina SCB1 and Alcaligenes sp. SCB2 were found to utilize anthracene and pyrene more quickly than naphthalene and phenanthrene, whereas Achromobacter xylosoxidans SCB6 and Pseudomonas putida SCB7 exhibited similar growth and degradation patterns except for pyrene. These facts suggest that the rhizosphere microorganisms capable of PAH degradation might be used to clean up the contamination sites with polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.477-482
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• 2008

A variety of bacterial strains were isolated from waste disposal sites of Uttaranchal, India, and some from artificially developed soil beds containing maleic anhydride, glucose, and small pieces of polyethylene. Primary screening of isolates was done based on their ability to utilize high- and low-density polyethylenes (HDPE/LDPE) as a primary carbon source. Thereafter, a consortium was developed using potential strains. Furthermore, a biodegradation assay was carried out in 500-ml flasks containing minimal broth (250ml) and HDPE/LDPE at 5mg/ml concentration. After incubation for two weeks, degraded samples were recovered through filtration and subsequent evaporation. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and simultaneous thermogravimetric-differential thermogravimetry-differential thermal analysis (TG-DTG-DTA) were used to analyze these samples. Results showed that consortium-treated HDPE (considered to be more inert relative to LDPE) was degraded to a greater extent (22.41% weight loss) in comparison with LDPE (21.70% weight loss), whereas, in the case of untreated samples, weight loss was more for LDPE than HDPE (4.5% and 2.5%, respectively) at $400^{\circ}C$. Therefore, this study suggests that polyethylene could be degraded by utilizing microbial consortia in an eco-friendly manner.