Abstract
Sugarcane Distillery Spent Wash (DSW) is among the most pollutant industrial effluents, generally characterized by high Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD), high mineral matters and acidic pH, causing strong environmental impacts. Bioremediation is considered to be a good and cheap alternative to DSW treatment. In this study, 37 strains of yeasts and filamentous fungi were performed to assess their potential to significantly reduce four parameters characterizing the organic load of vinasses (COD, pH, minerals and OD475nm). In all cases, a pH increase (until a final pH higher than 8.5, being an increase superior to 3.5 units, as compared to initial pH) and a COD and minerals removal could be observed, respectively (until 76.53% using Aspergillus terreus var. africanus and 77.57% using Aspergillus niger). Depending on the microorganism, the OD475nm could decrease (generally when filamentous fungi were used) or increase (generally when yeasts were used). Among the strains tested, the species from Aspergillus and Trametes genus offered the best results in the depollution of DSW. Concomitant with the pollutant load removal, fungal biomass, with yields exceeding 20 g·L−1, was produced.
Highlights
In 2012, 83 billion liters of ethanol was produced worldwide, from which a third was from Brazil [1,2]
Aerobic fermentation of Distillery Spent Wash (DSW) by Phanerochaete chrysosporium, Flavodon flavus, Fusarium proliferatum and Gibberella fujikuroi appeared to be less efficient strains for Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD) reduction, with 23.5%, 28%, 34% and 38%, respectively, whereas Aspergillus terreus var africanus, A. parasiticus, Trametes hirsuta, T. versicolor and A. terreus var. terreus showed the highest decrease in COD (76.53%, 74.60%, 74.01%, 73.64% and 73.5%, respectively)
The 9 Aspergillus and anamorph strains used in this study were among the most effective strains for COD reduction (COD reduction was higher than 65% for all 8 Aspergillus strains and 58.65% for Fennellia flavipes), indicating that these strains are interesting for their reduction of the pollution load of DSW
Summary
In 2012, 83 billion liters of ethanol was produced worldwide, from which a third was from Brazil [1,2]. A literature review indicated that species of filamentous fungi such as Penicillium, Aspergillus (A. niger, A. oryzae and A. terreus), Galactomyces geotrichum, Trametes versicolor, Phanerochaete chrysosporium and Flavodon flavus and the yeasts Candida tropicalis, P. jadinii and Issatchenkia orientalis had already been highlighted because of their ability to remove refractory compounds from distillery wastewater [7,8,20,27,28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36] Most of these strains were tested in different and heterogeneous conditions and not all on vinasse from sugarcane distilleries. The capacity of each strain to grow and metabolize the substrates contained in vinasse was evaluated by following the evolution of a number of physicochemical parameters such as pH, COD, mineral matter, optical density and microbial biomass production
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