Loofa sponge immobilized fungal biosorbent: a robust system for cadmium and other dissolved metal removal from aqueous solution

The potential of loofa sponge discs to immobilize fungal biomass of Phanerochaete chrysosporium (a known biosorbent) was investigated as a low cost biosorbent for the removal of Cd(II) ions from aqueous solution. A comparison of the biosorption of Cd(II) by immobilized and free fungal biomass from 10 to 500 mg l(-1) aqueous solutions showed an increase in uptake of over 19% when the biomass is immobilized (maximum biosorption capacity of 89 and 74 mg Cd(II) g(-1) biomass for immobilized and free biomass respectively at a solution pH of 6). Equilibrium was established within 1h and biosorption was well defined by the Langmuir isotherm model. The immobilized biomass could be regenerated using 50 mM HCl, with up to 99% metal recovery and reused in ten biosorption-desorption cycles without significant loss of capacity. This study suggests that such an immobilized biosorbent system has the potential to be used in the industrial removal/recovery of cadmium and other pollutant metal ions from aqueous solution.