Membrane surface roughness promotes rapid initial cell adhesion and long term microalgal biofilm stability

Abstract

In biofilm membrane photobioreactors development, conscientious works revolving around the effect of external environment factors on microalgal biofilm growth were assessed but more comparative research about the role of carrier surfaces properties such as surface roughness is necessary. Thus, commercial polyethersulfone (PES) membranes with two different molecular-weight-cut-offs (1 kDa and 30 kDa) were selected as the main representatives of surface roughness in a 20 days long-term biofilm cultivation experiment under dynamic flow condition for the biofilm evolvement of three benthic diatoms (Amphora coffeaeformis, Cylindrotheca fusiformis and Navicula incerta). Results depicted that rougher 30 kDa PES enable higher cell attachment degree for C. fusiformis (25.85 ± 2.75 × 109 cells m−2), followed by A. coffeaeformis (11.86 ± 2.76 × 109 cells m−2) and N. incerta (10.10 ± 0.65 × 109 cells m−2). Bounded extracellular polymeric substances (bEPS) gathered were relatively higher than soluble EPS (sEPS) while bEPS accumulated at least 10% higher on smooth 1 kDa PES than rough 30 kDa PES for the purpose of enhancing the biofilm disruption resistivity under liquid flow. Moreover, cell adhesion mechanism was proposed via computational fluid dynamics in parallel with EPS analysis. Copious amount of asperities and stagnant zones present on rough 30 kDa surfaces accelerated biofilm development and the consistency of the results have a great valence for interpretation of microalgal biofilm lifestyle on porous surfaces.