• Journal of Wetlands Research
• /
• v.26 no.2
• /
• pp.168-181
• /
• 2024

Constructed wetlands (CWs) deliver a range of ecosystem services, including the removal of contaminants, sequestration and storage of carbon, and enhancement of biodiversity. These services are facilitated through hydrological and ecological processes such as infiltration, adsorption, water retention, and evapotranspiration by plants and microorganisms. This study investigated the correlations between microbial populations, soil physicochemical properties, and treatment efficiency in a horizontal subsurface flow constructed wetland (HSSF CW) treating runoff from roads and parking lots. The methods employed included storm event monitoring, water quality analysis, soil sampling, soil quality parameter analysis, and microbial analysis. The facility achieved its highest pollutant removal efficiencies during the warm season (>15℃), with rates ranging from 33% to 74% for TSS, COD, TN, TP, and specific heavy metals including Fe, Zn, and Cd. Meanwhile, the highest removal efficiency was 35% for TOC during the cold season (≤15℃). These high removal rates can be attributed to sedimentation, adsorption, precipitation, plant uptake, and microbial transformations within the CW. Soil analysis revealed that the soil from HSSF CW had a soil organic carbon content 3.3 times higher than that of soil collected from a nearby landscape. Stoichiometric ratios of carbon (C), nitrogen (N), and phosphorus (P) in the inflow and outflow were recorded as C:N:P of 120:1.5:1 and 135.2:0.4:1, respectively, indicating an extremely low proportion of N and P compared to C, which may challenge microbial remediation efficiency. Additionally, microbial analyses indicated that the warm season was more conducive to microorganism growth, with higher abundance, richness, diversity, homogeneity, and evenness of the microbial community, as manifested in the biodiversity indices, compared to the cold season. Pollutants in stormwater runoff entering the HSSF CW fostered microbial growth, particularly for dominant phyla such as Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria, Acidobacteria, and Bacteroidetes, which have shown moderate to strong correlations with specific soil properties and changes in influent-effluent concentrations of water quality parameters.

• The Korean Journal of Mycology
• /
• v.36 no.1
• /
• pp.93-97
• /
• 2008

A $Ca^{2+}-independent$ microbial transglutaminase (mTGase) from the actinomycete Streptomyces mobaraensis IFO13819 is a useful enzyme in the food industry. It is consists 406 amino acid residues, which comprised leader and pro region of 75 amino acid residues and the structure region of 331 amino acid residues. Pro and structure gene of TGase were cloned into the yeast shuttle vector pYAEG-TER and then used to transform Saccharomyces cerevisiae 2805. Expression of mTGase in recombinant was confirmed with Northern hybridization and the maximal activity of TGase was shown 26 mU/ml.

• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
• /
• v.39 no.5
• /
• pp.474-481
• /
• 2013

Objectives: This study was conducted to investigate the application of microbial fuel cells (MFCs) to the wastewater treatment systems employed in the Living Building Challenge. Methods: I reviewed a range of information on decentralized wastewater treatment technologies such as composting toilets, constructed wetlands, recirculating biofilters, membrane bioreactors, and MFCs. Results: The Living Building Challenge is a set of standards to make buildings more eco-friendly using renewable resources and self-treating water systems. Although there are various decentralized wastewater treatment technologies available, MFCs have been considered an attractive future option for a decentralized system as used in the Living Building Challenge. MFCs can directly convert substrate energy to electricity with high conversion efficiency at ambient and even at low temperatures. MFCs do not require energy input for aeration if using open-air cathodes. Moreover, MFCs have the potential for widespread application in locations lacking water and electrical infrastructure Conclusions: This paper demonstrated the feasibility of MFCs as a novel decentralized wastewater treatment system employed in the Living Building Challenge.

• KSBB Journal
• /
• v.11 no.5
• /
• pp.550-556
• /
• 1996

A complex medium was developed for the production of microbial cellulose by Acetobacter xylinum ATCC 23769. The optimum concentration of each nutrient for the production of microbial cellulose was determined to be 10g peptone, 20g yeast extract, 5g glucose, 1.56g Na2HPO4, 1.8g KH2PO4, 0.05g MgSO4, 0.002g FeCl3, 5g citric acid and 10 mL ethanol per liter. With synergistic effects of citric acid and ethanol, cellulose productivity achieved in developed medium was 0.446 gram of cellulose per gram glucose for static culture, which is much higher than reported values. Cell growth and the cellulose production in the developed medium under static culture was also investigated.

• KSBB Journal
• /
• v.29 no.4
• /
• pp.225-231
• /
• 2014

A microbial fuel cell (MFC) and bioelectrochemical systems are novel bioprocesses which employ exoelectrogenic biofilm on electrode as a biocatalyst for electricity generation and various useful chemical production. Previous reports show that electrogenic biofilms of MFCs are time varying systems and dynamically interactive with the electrically conductive media (carbon paper as terminal electron acceptor). It has been reported that maximum power point tracking (MPPT) method can automatically control load by algorithm so that increase power generation and columbic efficiency. In this study, we developed logic based control strategy for external load resistance by using $LabVIEW^{TM}$ which increases the power production with using flat-plate MFCs and MPPT circuit board. The flat-plate MFCs inoculated with anaerobic digester sludge were stabilized with fixed external resistance from $1000{\Omega}$ to $100{\Omega}$. Automatic load control with MPPT started load from $52{\Omega}$ during 120 hours of operation. MPPT control strategy increased approximately 2.7 times of power production and power density (1.95 mW and $13.02mW/m^3$) compared to the initial values before application of MPPT (0.72 mW and $4.79mW/m^3$).

• Membrane and Water Treatment
• /
• v.6 no.1
• /
• pp.53-75
• /
• 2015

This paper provides an overview of the role of membranes in bioelectrochemical systems (BESs). Bioelectrochemical systems harvest clean energy from waste organic sources by employing indigenous exoelectrogenic bacteria. This energy is extracted in the form of bioelectricity or valuable biofuels such as ethanol, methane, hydrogen, and hydrogen peroxide. Various types of membranes were applied in these systems, the most common membrane being the cation exchange membrane. In this paper, we discuss three major bioelectrochemical technology research areas namely microbial fuel cells (MFCs), microbial electrolysis cells (MECs) and microbial desalination cells (MDCs). The operation principles of these BESs, role of membranes in these systems and various factors that affect their performance and economics are discussed in detail. Among the three technologies, the MFCs may be functional with or without membranes as separators while the MECs and MDCs require membrane separators. The preliminary economic analysis shows that the capital and operational costs for BESs will significantly decrease in the future due mainly to differences in membrane costs. Currently, MECs appear to be cost-competitive and energy-yielding technology followed by MFCs. Future research endeavors should focus on maximizing the process benefits while simultaneously minimizing the membrane costs related to fouling, maintenance and replacement.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
• /
• v.31 no.9
• /
• pp.1305-1310
• /
• 2021

Shikimate is a key high-demand metabolite for synthesizing valuable antiviral drugs, such as the anti-influenza drug, oseltamivir (Tamiflu). Microbial-based strategies for shikimate production have been developed to overcome the unstable and expensive supply of shikimate derived from traditional plant extraction processes. In this study, a microbial cell factory using Corynebacterium glutamicum was designed to overproduce shikimate in a fed-batch culture system. First, the shikimate kinase gene (aroK) responsible for converting shikimate to the next step was disrupted to facilitate the accumulation of shikimate. Several genes encoding the shikimate bypass route, such as dehydroshikimate dehydratase (QsuB), pyruvate kinase (Pyk1), and quinate/shikimate dehydrogenase (QsuD), were disrupted sequentially. An artificial operon containing several shikimate pathway genes, including aroE, aroB, aroF, and aroG were overexpressed to maximize the glucose uptake and intermediate flux. The rationally designed shikimate-overproducing C. glutamicum strain grown in an optimized medium produced approximately 37.3 g/l of shikimate in 7-L fed-batch fermentation. Overall, rational cell factory design and culture process optimization for the microbial-based production of shikimate will play a key role in complementing traditional plant-derived shikimate production processes.

• New & Renewable Energy
• /
• v.18 no.2
• /
• pp.9-17
• /
• 2022

In this study, we used the Flux Balance Analysis (FBA) program to examine the behavior of hydrogen and organic acids according to seasonal changes in food wastewater collected from D city. The results showed that average hydrogen conversion rates in spring, summer, autumn, and winter were 1.06, 0.71, 1.21, and 1.13 mol H₂/mol of hexose_added, respectively, indicating a significantly lower hydrogen conversion rate in summer than in other seasons. This phenomenon is believed to occur because the carbohydrate concentration of the incoming food wastewater is low. In addition, Lactobacillus, the lactic acid-producing bacterium, was 21.3% in spring, 27.2% in summer, 17.5% in autumn, and 22.6% in winter. The most distinctive feature of the microbial community in summer was that 15.3% of the Ilyobacter was analyzed. It was confirmed that Ilyobacter, which is involved in the production of acetic acid and propionic acid, is closely associated with the tendency of increasing acetic acid and propionic acid and thus contributes to organic acid change. Clostridium, a hydrogen-producing bacterium, was 76.2%, 50.8%, 78.3%, and 74%, in spring, summer, autumn, and winter, respectively. It was confirmed that Clostridium dominates the microbial community by approximately 70% or more in all seasons except summer.

• Journal of Life Science
• /
• v.30 no.10
• /
• pp.919-929
• /
• 2020

Aromatic compounds are widely used in the chemical, food, polymer, cosmetic, and pharmaceutical industries and are produced by mainly chemical synthesis using benzene, toluene, and xylene or by plant extraction methods. Due to many rising threats, including the depletion of fossil fuels, global warming, the strengthening of international environmental regulations, and the excessive harvesting of plant resources, the microbial production of aromatic compounds using renewable biomass is regarded as a promising alternative. By integrating metabolic engineering with synthetic and systems biology, artificial biosynthetic pathways have been reconstituted from L-tryptophan biosynthetic pathway in relevant microorganisms, such as Escherichia coli and Corynebacterium glutamicum, enabling the production of a variety of value-added aromatic compounds, such as 5-hydroxytryptophan, serotonin, melatonin, 7-chloro-L-tryptophan, 7-bromo-L-tryptophan, indigo, indirubin, indole-3-acetic acid, violacein, and dexoyviolacein. In this review, we summarize the characteristics, usage, and biosynthetic pathways of these aromatic compounds and highlight the latest metabolic engineering strategies for the microbial production of aromatic compounds and suitable solution strategies to overcome problems in increasing production titers. It is expected that strain development based on systems metabolic engineering and the optimization of media and bioprocesses using renewable biomass will enable the development of commercially viable technologies for the microbial production of many aromatic compounds.

• Journal of Life Science
• /
• v.30 no.2
• /
• pp.129-136
• /
• 2020

For effective treatment of wastewater containing ammonium nitrogen (NH₄-N), AT2, AT9, and AT12 strains, having high total organic carbon (TOC) removal capability, and FN47, possessing excellent ammonia nitrogen removal capability present in the activated sludge in the aeration tank of food wastewater treatment plants, were isolated and identified. The cells of these isolated strains were used for microbial augmentation with FIW-1 in the defatted rice bran as a medium to treat industrial wastewater. The investigation of the cultural characteristics of these isolated strains in the aeration tank showed that the affinities for substrate of the isolated strains were extremely high, of which AT12 (Alcaligenes sp. AT12) was the highest among the isolated strains. Ammonium nitrogen removal efficiency in the food wastewater was 71% in the isolated strain FN47 (Microbacterium sp. FN47) treatment group. When only activated sludge was added in the lab scale pilot using food wastewater during continuous culture experiment, the TOC removal efficiency was 63%. Meanwhile, the removal efficiency of 92% was obtained when the microbial augmentation FIW-1 for wastewater treatment was applied. In addition, the chemical oxygen demand (COD) level from the effluent wherein microbial augmentation FIW-1 was input for the initial three days in the wastewater treatment site experiment showed a treatment rate of about 43%, which was increased to 62% after an elapse of 5 days.