Physical and chemical conditions for microbial oil degradation

Abstract

Oil residues arising from the Christos-Bitas spillage were found to contain 28% of oil extractable by carbon tetrachloride; the remainder comprised water and undefined solids. When incubated in 8-L rectangular tanks with a mixed population of mainly bacteria to which diammonium hydrogen phosphate was added, ca. 97% of the Christos-Bitas oil fraction was degraded. When the same substrate was degraded by only three isolated Pseudomonas strains in 1-L cylindrical tanks, degradation was only ca. 56%. Raising the temperature from 20 to 50 degrees C brought about a visible loss in cell viability with only ca. 38% of the substrate degraded. Oil degradation proceeded in direct proportion to increases in cell attachment to the dispersed oil. The aliphatic fraction of Kuwait crude oil up to nC(25) measured by gas liquid chromatography (GLC) was oxidized within 48 h. Using this substrate the three pseudomonads together brought about a more complete degradation (87%) than a single Bacillus isolate. The Bacillusstrain was capable of deggrading between 50 and 65% of the crude, depending on whether diammonium hydrogen phosphate supplemented a peptone-based medium. The preferential biodgradability of fractions was the following aliphatics > aromatics > asphalts, as has been widely reported.