Capacity of simultaneous removal of zinc and cadmium from contaminated media, by two microalgae isolated from a polluted site

Abstract

Several aquatic environments have been contaminated with heavy metals dumped via industrial effluents. Numerous studies have been published regarding the removal of single metals from aqueous solutions by microalgal biomass. However, such studies do not reflect the actual problem associated with industrial effluents because usually more than one metal species is present. Here we studied the biosorption capacity of Zn2+ and Cd2+ as single- and binary-metal systems by two microalgae, Scenedesmus obliquus and Desmodesmus pleiomorphus, isolated from a polluted site in Northern Portugal. For each metal independently, D. pleiomorphus showed a higher metal sorption capacity than S. obliquus, at concentrations ranging from 60 to 300 mg/l (except 150 mgCd/l). Maximum amounts of Zn2+ and Cd2+ removed were 22.3 and 60.8 mg/g by S. obliquus, and 83.1 and 58.6 mg/g by D. pleiomorphus. In binary-metal solutions, S. obliquus was in general able to remove Zn2+ to higher extents than Cd2+, whereas the opposite was observed with D. pleiomorphus. The simultaneous uptake of Zn2+ and Cd2+ by both microalgae was considerably lower than that of their single-metal counterparts, at equivalent concentrations. Although microalgal uptake from binary-metal solutions was lower than from single-metal ones, the wild microalgae selected were able to efficiently take up mixtures of Zn2+ and Cd2+ up to 300 mg/l of both metals—thus materializing a promising bioremediation vector for polluted waters.