Characteristics of bacterial adhesion to activated carbon and their degradative potential for high strength substrate by biological activated carbon

Abstract

To examine the removal chracteristics of substrate by biological activated carbon (BAC), adhesional potential of various bacteria to three species of activated carbon (AC) and porous ceramics (PC) as a carier and removal efficiency of pepton broth by BAC were studied in batch culture experiment. Physical adsorption capacity of the carriers was as follow: F-400 AC > Palm AC > Kureha AC > PC.Adsorption capacity was depended on the specific surface area. In no relevance to the species of carriers, the adhesional potential of bacteria to the carriers with and without substrate was ordered by E.coli > P.ovalis > A.calcoaceticus > M.luteus > B.subtilis.The adhesional amount of bacteria on PC was higher than any other carriers. In the effect of dissolved organic carbon removal by BAC, F-400 AC with P.ovalis, which had the widest surface area, was the most effective in the four species of carriers. It was found that two factors, the specific surface area of AC and the species of bacteria was important for the efficiency of BAC.