Ecology, Environment and Conservation Paper

AN OVERVIEW OF BIOREACTORS AND THEIR APPLICATION INTHE BIOSORPTION OF HEAVY METALS

Shweta Tiwari and Deepak K. Sinha

Abstract

Atmospheric toxicants in the form of heavy metals are major threat to human species on earth. Heavy metalions are accumulative in nature and non-biodegradable. There minute amount in human body is verydangerous, henceforth there removal is necessary. Many physical and chemical methods like ion- exchange,ultra filtration, reverse osmosis, electrochemical treatment, chemical precipitation, evaporation, membranetechnologies are employed for remediation of heavy metals from wastewaters but due to some disadvantagesthere is a requirement of such bioremediation technology which should be environmental friendly and a natural method. Biosorption is one such method which is of great attractive alternative of conventionalmethods. Bioremediation technologies are now linked to bioreactors to make removal process more efficientfrom wastewater. Performance of some bioreactors is found to be very good for the removal of heavymetals through biosorption. So, one objective of this paper is to highlight the efficiency ofbiosorptioninvolved in bioreactors. Here we discuss different types of bioreactors fixed bed, fluidized bioreactor, stirredtank, airlift bioreactors which are being used for the biosorption process. This article alsohighlights thesignificance of standard bioreactors and a possible usage of nanoparticles based bioreactorswhich willdefinitely be very useful in near future. Further, green synthesis of nanoparticles is also aninterestingtechnology that will revolutionize the process of biosorption.