• Korean Journal of Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences
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• v.38 no.6
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• pp.347-352
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• 2005

These experiments investigated the conditioning pattern and the nitrification efficiency of a fluidized sand biofilter (FSB) for seawater application. The FSB fed artificial nutrient was fully conditioned within 22 weeks. The maximum nitrification efficiency of the FSB was achieved at a superficial water velocity (SWV) of 1.0 cm/sec. After fixing the superficial water velocity at 1.0 cm/sec, the nitrification rates of the FSB were assessed at 3 total ammonia nitrogen (TAN) loading rates (250, 500, 1,000 g TAN/$m^3$/day) and 3 water temperatures (12, 16, $20^{\circ}C$). The TAN concentration in the simulated culture tank ranged from 2.87 to 9.72 mg/L at TAN loading rate of 1,000 g TAN/$m^3$/day, while that ranged from 0.45 to 1.26 mg/L at TAN loading rate of 500 g TAN/$m^3$/day. The ranges of TAN concentration in the former were too high for aquatic organisms and those in the latter were acceptable. Therefore, the safe TAN loading rate for the FSB in seawater conditions was decided as 500 g TA/$m^3$/day. From these results, daily TAN removal rates (g TAN/$m^3$/day) of FSB under conditions of inlet TAN concentration (C, mg/L) and water temperature (T, $^{\circ}C$) were calculated by the following non-linear multi-regression equation: TAN removal rate: f(z)=-1,311.295+655.714LnT+225.775LnC ($r^2=0.962$).