• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.261-279
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• 2019

The aim of this review article is to summarize the role of titanium oxide ($TiO_2$) nanomaterials in the remediation of the aquatic environment contaminated with various emerging pollutants. The advanced oxidation process led by the semiconductor $TiO_2$ is an impetus in the remediation technology. Therefore, a vast number of literature works are available in this area. Further, the role of modified $TiO_2$ or thin film materials were discussed in the review. Also, the Localized Surface Plasmon Resonance (LSPR) effect of using noble metaldoped $TiO_2$ played an interesting role in the remediation process.

• Progress in Superconductivity and Cryogenics
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.20-25
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• 2021

Milking parlor wastewater contains high concentration suspended solid (SS), nitrogen, and/or phosphate as well as organic compounds. A new biological wastewater process by magnetic separation, magnetic activated sludge (MAS) process, was applied to milking parlor wastewater treatment process. A three step wastewater treatment process of coagulation sedimentation / ammonia stripping (C/S), magnetic activated sludge process and contact oxidation (CO) was proposed for removal of these pollutants. First step, C/S process recovered 96% TN and 96% PO₄^3--P as resource for fertilizer from the wastewater. 81% biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) in wastewater was removed after MAS process. As a results, all pollutant concentrations satisfied Japanese effluent standards. Most of residual BOD and SS were removed by the CO process. It was estimated that the proposed process could reduce the process space to 1/7.

• Food Science and Industry
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• v.54 no.1
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• pp.2-10
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• 2021

Microplastics with a size of less than 5 mm have emerged as an important environmental and food safety issue, as they have been detected not only in marine but also in terrestrial ecosystem and drinking water. Although many studies have been conducted on the exposure of microplastics and the effects on human health, the lack of standardized experimental methods for microplastics has been reviewed as a major problem. In order to overcome this, European countries such as the Netherlands and Germany are conducting a project to develop detection methods for microplastics as well as to establish the risk assessment methodologies for microplastics. Being the microplastics suggested to have a substantially potential risk on human health, reliable risk assessments should be conducted considering the various sources of microplastics, chemical pollutants and biological factors. In addition, international standards and regulations should be applied.

• Progress in Superconductivity and Cryogenics
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.7-12
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• 2023

Isolation of pollutant-degrading bacteria is important in bioaugmentation, one of the methods for biological degradation of environmental contaminants. We focused on the magnetic activated sludge (MAS) process as a culture method that efficiently concentrates degrading bacteria, and cultured activated sludge with 1,4-dioxane as a model pollutant. After 860 days of operation, MLVSS, which indicates the amount of sludge, increased from 390 mg/L to 10,000 mg/L, and the removal rate of organic matter including 1,4-dioxane, tetrahydrofuran, and glucose in the artificial wastewater reached up to 97%. Based on these results, the MAS process was successfully used to acclimate activated sludge with 1,4-dioxane. Bacterial flora analysis in the MAS showed that bacteria of the genus Pseudonocardia, already reported as 1,4-dioxane degrading bacteria, play an important role in the degradation of this pollutant. The MAS process is a suitable culture method for acclimation of environmental pollutants, and the findings indicate that it can be used as an enrichment unit for pollutant-degrading bacteria.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.84-98
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• 2000

Control of Trihalomethanes(THMs) is a major concern of many water treatment plants. A number of researchers have studied the effectiveness of activated carbon adsorption process in removing THMs or organic halogen compounds. Recently, attention has been paid to the biological activated carbon (BAC) treatment of THM precursors as an alternative to the carbon adsorption treatment because of its effectiveness as well as its low running cost. In this study, changes of THM formation potential(THMFP) and removal of substrates in the SBR effluent were investigated in an attempt to clarify the mechanisms of the decrease/increase of THMFP in the BAC treatment. The increase and decrease of THMFP concentrations were observed in effluents during prolonged operation. When PCP or DBS was feeded as substrate contained in SBR effluent, the THMFPs were easyly removed with TOCs removal. But the case of SBR effluent containing SDS or glycine was introduced, and when microbial growth came to its near steady state, the THMFPs of treated effluents were increased more or less in comparison to those in the influents. Such increases of THMFP coincided with the increase in microbial growth within the activated carbon fiber(ACF) column. In the case of only sucrose was feeded as substrate on ACF colume, THMFP concentrations of effluent were higher than those of influent. The THMFP concentration was significantly increased on inlet part of ACF column, which biomass inhabits abundantly, then they were decreased gradually. These increases mean production of the secondary THM precursors by biological activities, which can be removed by adsorption and biological degradation on ACF column.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.44 no.1
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• pp.29-36
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• 2008

Nitrogen is one of the major pollutants that should be removed by wastewater treatment systems. Biological nitrogen removal (BNR) is a key technology in advanced wastewater treatment systems operated by bacterial populations. Nitrification is the first step of microbiological processes in BNR system. Ammonia is oxidized to nitrite by ammonia-oxidizing bacteria (AOB) and then nitrite is subsequently oxidized to nitrate by nitrite-oxidizing bacteria (NOB). The diversity of NOB in nitrification reactors of 3 BNR systems, Edited biological aerated filter system, Nutrient removal laboratory system, and the Rumination type sequencing batch reactor system, was investigated by terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism (T-RFLP) analysis of 16S rRNA genes. Cluster analysis of T-RF profiles showed that communities of Nitrobacter group in each system were different depending upon the process of systems. However, the clusters of Nitrospira group were divided by the habitat of aqueous and solid samples.

• Carbon letters
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.28-33
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• 2010

In this study, $TiO_2$-Activated carbon (AC) complex fibers were prepared by electrospinning for the synergetic effect of adsorption and degradation of organic pollutant. The average diameter of these fibers increased with increasing the amount of AC added, except for 1AC-TOF (AC$/TiO_2$ =1/40 mass ratio). After calcinations at $500^{\circ}C$, long as-spun fibers were broken and their average diameter was slightly decreased. The resultant fibers after calcination had rough surface and sphere shapes like a peanut. From XRD results, it was confirmed that as-spun fibers were changed to anatase $Ti_O2$ fiber after calcinations at $500^{\circ}C$. The prepared $TiO_2$-AC complex fibers could remove procian blue dyes by solar light irradiation with high removal property of 94~99%. The PB dye was rapidly removed by adsorption during the initial 5 minutes. But after 5 minutes, dye removal was occurred by photodegradation. In this study, the most efficient AC/$TiO_2$ ratio of $TiO_2$-AC complex fibers was 5/40, showing the synergetic effect of adsorption and photodegradation. It is expected that the $TiO_2$-AC complex fibers can be used to remove of organic pollutants in water system.

• KSBB Journal
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• v.23 no.6
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• pp.479-483
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• 2008

The environmental contamination by organic pollutants is a widespread problem. The most widely distributed pollution can be attributed to oil contamination. Bioremediation, the use of microorganism or microbial processes to degrade environmental contaminant, is one of the new technologies. The objective of the present study is to study the degradation of JP-8 in soil by microorganism. The degradation of JP-8 was analysed by TPH using gas chromatography. Rhodococcus fascians isolated from the petroleum contaminated site was applied for the degradation of JP-8 in the soil column system. Air flow rate of 30 ml/min was sufficient to degrade JP-8 in the soil column as much as 70% of JP-8 in the soil column. The addition of nitrogen source resulted in the increase in JP-8 degradability to 75% of JP-8 and the C:N ratio for JP-8 degradation was 100:10.

• Membrane and Water Treatment
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.85-95
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• 2022

Tetrachloroethylene (PCE) and trichloroethylene (TCE), critical pollutants to human health and groundwater ecosystems, are managed by groundwater quality standards (GQS) in South Korea. However, there are no GQSs for their by-products, such as cis-dichloroethylene (DCE) and vinyl chloride (VC) produced through the dechlorination process of PCE and TCE. Therefore, in this study, we monitored PCE, TCE, cis-DCE, and VC in 111 national groundwater wells for three years (2016 to 2018) to evaluate their distributions, a biological dechlorination possibility, and human risk assessment. The detection frequency of them was 30.2% for PCE, 45.1% for TCE, 43.9% for cis-DCE and 13.4% for VC. The four chlorinated compounds were commonly detected in 21 out of 111 wells. In the results of statistical analysis with 21 wells data, DO and ORP also had a negative correlation with four organic chlorinated compounds, while EC and sulfate has a positive correlation with the compounds. This indicates that the 21 wells were relatively met with suitable environments for a biological dechlorination reaction compared to the other wells. Finally, cis-DCE had a non-carcinogenic risk of 10^-1 and the carcinogenic risk of VC was 10^-6 or higher. Through this study, the distribution status of the four chlorinated compounds in groundwater in South Korea and the necessity of preparing plans to manage cis-DCE and VC were confirmed.

• Journal of Applied Biological Chemistry
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• v.66
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• pp.29-38
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• 2023

Recent studies have highlighted the link between diseases and inflammation across our lifespan. Our sedentary lifestyle, high-calorie diet, chronic stress, chronic infections, and exposure to pollutants and xenobiotics, collectively intensify the course and recurrence of infections and inflammation in our bodies, promoting the prevalence of chronic diseases and aging. Given such phenomena and considering additional factors such as the frequency of prescription, and easy access to over-the-counter drugs, the need for anti-inflammatory therapeutics is ever-increasing. However, the readily available anti-inflammatory treatment option comes with a greater risk of side effects or high cost (biologics). Therefore in this growing competition of discovering and developing new potent anti-inflammatory drugs, we focused on utilizing the established knowledge of traditional medicine to find lead compounds. Since lead optimization is an indispensable step toward drug development, we applied this concept for the production of potent anti-inflammatory compounds achieved by structural modification of flavonoids. The derivative obtained through acetylation of myricetin, 3,3',4',5,5',7-hexaacetate myricetin, showed a greater inhibitory effect in the production of pro-inflammatory mediators such as nitric oxide, Prostaglandin E₂, and pro-inflammatory cytokines like interleukin-6, interleukin1β, in lipopolysaccharide-stimulated RAW264.7 mouse macrophage cells compared to myricetin. The increased potency of inhibition was in conjunction with an increased inhibitory effect on inducible nitric oxide synthase and cyclooxygenase-2 proteins. Through such measures, this study supports lead optimization for well-established lead compounds from traditional medicine using a simpler and greener chemistry approach for the purpose of designing and developing potent anti-inflammatory therapeutics with possibly fewer side effects and increased bioavailability.