A flow injection analysis system with encapsulated high-density Saccharomyces cerevisiae cells for rapid determination of biochemical oxygen demand

Abstract

The biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) determination was studied using a novel flow injection analysis (FIA) system with encapsulated Saccharomyces cerevisiae cells and an oxygen electrode and was compared with conventional 5-day BOD tests. S. cerevisiae cells were packed in a calcium alginate capsule at a dry cell weight of 250 g/l of capsule core. The level of dissolved oxygen (DO) was reduced due to the enhanced respiratory activity of the microbial cells when the injected nutrient passed through the bioreactor. The decrease in DO (DeltaDO) was intensified with the amount of microbial cells packed in the bioreactor. However, the specific DeltaDO decreased as the amount of cells loaded in the bioreactor increased. The DeltaDO value was dependent on the pH and temperature of the mobile phase and reached its maximum value at 35 degrees C and pH 7-8. Also, DeltaDO became larger at longer response times as the flow rate of the mobile phase decreased. The measurement of DeltaDO was repeated more than six times consecutively using a 20-ppm standard glucose and glutamic acid solution, which confirmed the reproducibility with a standard deviation of 0.95%. A strong linear correlation between DeltaDO and BOD was also observed. The 5-day BOD values of actual water and wastewater samples were in accordance with the BOD values obtained by this FIA method using encapsulated S. cerevisiae cells. Unlike the cell-immobilized bead system, there was no contamination of the bioreactor resulting from any leak of yeast cells from the sensor capsules during BOD measurements.