• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
• /
• v.27 no.10
• /
• pp.1798-1807
• /
• 2017

The differentiations in nitrogen-converting activity and microbial community structure between granular size fractions in a continuous completely autotrophic nitrogen removal over nitrite (CANON) reactor, having a superior specific nitrogen removal rate of $0.24g/(g\;VSS{\cdot}h)$, were investigated by batch tests and high-throughput pyrosequencing analysis, respectively. Results revealed that a high dissolved oxygen concentration (>1.8 mg/l) could result in efficient nitrite accumulation with small granules (0.2-0.6 mm in diameter), because aerobic ammonium-oxidizing bacteria (genus Nitrosomonas) predominated therein. Meanwhile, intermediate size granules (1.4-2.0 mm in diameter) showed the highest nitrogen removal activity of $40.4mg/(g\;VSS{\cdot}h)$ under sufficient oxygen supply, corresponding to the relative abundance ratio of aerobic to anaerobic ammonium-oxidizing bacteria (genus Candidatus Kuenenia) of 5.7. Additionally, a dual substrate competition for oxygen and nitrite would be considered as the main mechanism for repression of nitrite-oxidizing bacteria, and the few Nitrospira spp. did not remarkably affect the overall performance of the reactor. Because all the granular size fractions could accomplish the CANON process independently under oxygen limiting conditions, maintaining a diversity of granular size would facilitate the stability of the suspended growth CANON system.

• Journal of Korean Society of Water and Wastewater
• /
• v.28 no.2
• /
• pp.195-206
• /
• 2014

Immobilization of anaerobic ammonium oxidizing bacteria has been studied to enhance the biomass retention of the slowly growing bacteria and the process stability. The purpose of this study was to compare the nitrogen removal efficiency of granular and immobilized anammox bacteria with poly vinyl alcohol and alginate. The specific anammox activity of the granular, homoginized and immobilized anammox bacteria were $0.016{\pm}0.0002gN/gVSS/d$, $0.011{\pm}0.001gN/gVSS/d$ and $0.007{\pm}0.0005gN/gVSS/d$, respectively. Although the activity decreased to 43.7 % of the original one due to low pH and $O_2$ exposure during the homogination and the immobilization, it was rapidly recovered within 7 days in the following continuous culture. When synthetic T-N concentrations of 100, 200, 400, 800 mg/L were fed, the immobilized anammox bacteria showed higher nitrogen removal efficiencies at all operational conditions than those of granular anammox bacteria. When the sludge retention time was shorten below 30.7 days and the reject water was fed, the nitrite removal efficiency of the granular anammox bacteria dropped to 8 % of the initial value, while that of the immobilized anammox bacteria was maintained over 95 % of the initial one. The immobilization with poly vinyl alcohol and alginate would be a feasible method to improve the performance and stability of the anammox process.

• Journal of Korean Society on Water Environment
• /
• v.35 no.4
• /
• pp.362-369
• /
• 2019

In this study, biodegradation efficiency improvement of mixed sludge for the anaerobic digestion process in wastewater treatment plant was investigated. In order to release the organic material contained in the sludge cell and promote the hydrolysis step, mixed sludge of 7% TS (Total Solids) was physically shear-treated at a shear strength of 1,000 ~ 4,000 rpm and a maximum of 120 mins. As a result of the comparison between mixed sludge before and after the treatment, the concentration of $SCOD_{Cr}$(Soluble Chemical Oxygen Demand-chromium method) was increased through the conversion of granular organic matter into dissolved organic matter as shear strength and treatment time increases. The solubilization efficiency increased rapidly after 30 min of solubilization application time, and they were 11.23 %, 20.10 %, 22.52 % and 25.43% at 120 min for each shear strength conditions, respectively. Additionally, the BMP(Biochemical Methane Potential) test was conducted with the optimized samples to determine the increase of methane production by the shear pre-treatment. Consequently, methane production of each samples were 0.275, 0.310, 0.323 and $0.335m^3/kg\;VS_{add}$, which indicates that methane production was increased to a maximum of 21.28% compared to the control without the solubilization process ($0.262m^3/kg\;VS_{add}$). As a result, the physical shear-treatment is a promising process for sewage sludge pre-treatment to reduce the organic waste and increase the energy production.

• Journal of Life Science
• /
• v.21 no.10
• /
• pp.1473-1480
• /
• 2011

Perchlorate ($ClO_4^-$) is a contaminant found in surface water and soil/ground water. Microbial removal of perchlorate is the method of choice since microorganisms can reduce perchlorate into harmless end-products. Such microorganisms require an electron donor to reduce perchlorate. Conventional perchlorate-removal techniques employ heterotrophic perchlorate-reducing bacteria that use organic compounds as electron donors to reduce perchlorate. Since continuous removal of perchlorate requires a continuous supply of organic compounds, heterotrophic perchlorate removal is an expensive process. Feasibility of autotrophic perchlorate-removal using elemental sulfur granules and activated sludge was examined in this study. Granular sulfur is relatively inexpensive and activated sludge is easily available from wastewater treatment plants. Batch tests showed that activated sludge microorganisms could successfully degrade perchlorate in the presence of granular sulfur as an electron donor. Perchlorate biodegradation was confirmed by molar yield of $Cl^-$ as the perchlorate was degraded. Scanning electron microscope revealed that rod-shaped microorganisms on the surface of sulfur particles were used for the autotrophic perchlorate-removal, suggesting that sulfur particles could serve as supporting media for the formation of biofilm as well. DGGE analyses revealed that microbial profile of the inoculum (activated sludge) was different from that of the biofilm sample obtained from enrichment culture that used sulfur particles for $ClO_4^-$-degradation.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
• /
• v.38 no.2
• /
• pp.79-86
• /
• 2016

The purpose of this study is to efficiently improve biological sequencing batch reactor (SBR) system of high-concentrated nitrate nitrogen in reverse osmosis (RO) concentrates by total dissolved solids (TDS) regulation. Since a laboratory-scale SBR system had been operated, we had analyzed specific denitrification rate (SDNR) and specific oxygen uptake rate (SOUR) for microbial activity in according to various injection concentration of TDS. As a result, higher injection concentration of TDS decreased SDNR, and delayed denitrification within denitrification process. Moreover, the higher injection concentration of TDS was, the lower microbial activity was during operation of laboratory-scale SBR system. Therefore, the regulation of TDS injection concentration is necessary to improve efficiency of nitrate nitrogen in the biological SBR system, and treatment of calcium ion ($Ca^{2+}$) is also specifically focused to remove nitrate nitrogen. Moreover, analytical data of SDNR and SOUR can be the effective kinetic design parameters to application of biological treatment of RO concentrate by aerobic granular sludge (AGS).

• Journal of the Korea Organic Resources Recycling Association
• /
• v.29 no.4
• /
• pp.33-40
• /
• 2021

In this study, the physico-chemical and biological characteristics of anaerobic granular sludge at different heights of a full-scale UASB reactor (UASBr) were investigated. Granular sludge was taken from 1 m, 2 m, and 3 m above the ground level in the UASBr. The morphological analysis showed that the upper part had bigger granules and the lower part had rounder granules. The ANOVA test confirmed that the mean size and the roundness of the granules had statistically significant difference along the height at 95% confidence level, and there was a significant negative linear relationship between the size and roundness (r=-0.40, p<0.05). A SMA test using acetic, propionic and butyric acids showed that granules from 2 m height had the highest specific methanogenic activity. The EPS contents were also unequal to each height, with 2 m showing the highest content. These findings could be helpful to understand the different characteristics of stratified anaerobic granules in full-scale UASBr and maintain the reactor performance.

• Journal of Life Science
• /
• v.23 no.5
• /
• pp.676-681
• /
• 2013

Perchlorate (${ClO_4}^-$) is an emerging contaminant found in surface water and soil/groundwater. Microbial removal of perchlorate is the method of choice since perchlorate-reducing bacteria (PRB) can reduce perchlorate to harmless end-products. A previous study [3] showed experimental evidence of autotrophic perchlorate removal using elemental sulfur granules and activated sludge. The granular sulfur is a relatively inexpensive electron donor, and activated sludge is easily available from a wastewater treatment plant. A batch test was performed in this study to further investigate the effect of various environmental parameters on the perchlorate degradation by sludge microorganisms when elemental sulfur was used as electron donor. Results of the batch test suggest optimum conditions for autotrophic perchlorate degradation by sludge microorganisms. The results also show that sulfur-oxidizing PRB enriched from activated sludge removed perchlorate better than activated sludge. Taken together, this study suggests that autotrophic perchlorate removal using elemental sulfur and activated sludge can be improved by employing optimized environmental conditions and enrichment culture.

• Journal of the Korea Organic Resources Recycling Association
• /
• v.14 no.4
• /
• pp.151-160
• /
• 2006

Anaerobic treatment of landfill leachate was studied to investigate the behaviors of pollutant and the characteristics of microorganism for 10 months. The upflow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) reactor achieved about 90% chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal at organic loading rates(OLR) up to $20kgCOD/m^3.d$. At higher OLR ($8-20kgCOD/m^3.d$), the propionate concentration increased, indicating that converting propionate to acetate was the rate-limiting step. Nevertheless, increase in the precipitate inside and on the surface of granules as well as on the wall of the reactor resulted in operational problems. The main inorganic precipitate in the granule was calcium compound. Although specific methanogenic activity (SMA) was not affected seriously in this study, metals had to be removed prior to anaerobic treatment so as to be free from the excessive inorganic accumulation that resulted in operational problems.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
• /
• v.31 no.10
• /
• pp.919-926
• /
• 2009

Enrichment of anaerobic ammonium oxidation (ANAMMOX) bacteria is the essential step for operating full-scale ANAMMOX bioreactor because adding a significant amount of seeding sludge is required to stabilize the ANAMMOX reactor. In this study, the enrichment of ANAMMOX bacteria from an activated sludge using sequencing batch reactor was conducted and verified by analyzing changes in the microbial community structure. ANAMMOX bacteria were successfully enriched for 70 days and the substrate removal efficiencies showed 98.5% and 90.7% for $NH_4\;^+$ and $NO_2\;^-$ in the activity test, respectively. The phylogenetic trees of Planctomycetes phylum showed that the diverse microbial community structure of an activated sludge was remarkably simplified after the enrichment. All 36 clones, obtained after the enrichment, were affiliated with ANAMMOX bacteria of Candidatus Brocadia (36%) and Candidatus Anammoxoglobus (64%) genera. The quantification using real-time quantitative PCR (RTQ-PCR) revea ed that the 16S rDNA concentration of ANAMMOX bacteria was 74.8% compared to the granular ANAMMOX sludge obtained from an upflow ANAMMOX sludge bed reactor which had been operated for more than one year. The results of molecular analysis supported that the enriched sludge could be used as a seeding sludge for a full-scale ANAMMOX bioreactor.

• KSBB Journal
• /
• v.16 no.2
• /
• pp.133-139
• /
• 2001

To treat piggery wastewaters containing refractory compounds including nitrogen, biological treatments were investigated. In biological treatment, the removal efficiencies of organics and nitrogen by the activated sludge process and bioreactor using a BACC (Biological Activated Carbon Cartridge) media filled with granular activated carbon were examined. The results were as follows; in the biological process, when the approximate influent BOD concentration of 620 mg/L, through dilution, was treated by the activated sludge process, the process should be operated at a HRT of over 8 days to maintain an effluent BOD concentration of lower than 100 mg/L. In the treatment of piggery wastewater using a BACC bioreactor, when the HRT was 200 hours, the BOD, COD(sub)cr, and TKN removal efficiency of the effluent were 94, 75 and 64.3%, respectively. Comparing the BACC bioreactor with the activated sludge process, when the volumetric loading rate was 0.3 g BOD/L.day, the specific substrate removal rate of BOD was 0.14 g BOD removed/L.day in the activated sludge process which compared with 0.27 g BOD removed/L$.$day in the BACC bioreactor. The BACC bioreactor showed on average a 2-fold higher removal rate and was superior to the activated sludge process in wastewater treatment in terms of variations of loading time and high loading time. Therefore, the BACC process can effectively treat piggery wastewater containing high concentrations of nitrogen and organic compounds.