Abating whey organic load through ethanol and lactic acid production by kefir

Abstract

The extent to which selected ethanol and lactic acid production bioprocesses contribute to whey waste abatement was examined. Alcoholic fermentation of whey was carried out by kefir cells immobilized on grape stalks, delignified cellulosic materials, or brewer's spent grains. Lactic acid fermentation was also performed by free kefir cells with or without addition of brewer's spent grains as promoting material. Since whey fermentation rate is affected by the lactose uptake rate, ¹⁴C-labeled lactose was used to study the fermentation ability of kefir. The highest reductions in biochemical oxygen demand and chemical oxygen demand of whey, about 68% and 52%, respectively, were achieved by lactic acid fermentation in 6 h at 37 °C and pH 5.5, in the presence of 120 g brewer's spent grains. Additionally, at the same conditions, the highest ¹⁴C-labeled lactose uptake rate by kefir and consequently the highest alcoholic fermentation rate were also recorded. However, greater reductions in biochemical oxygen demand and chemical oxygen demand of whey are required prior to final disposal.     

Characterization of biological responses under different environmental conditions: A hierarchical modeling approach

A natural river system is organized as a nested hierarchy of interconnected habitats with specific environmental conditions to which the biological community has adapted. Due to this hierarchical structure, identifying the role of different stressors on the biological community is a formidable task. Efforts trying to link stressors to biological integrity have always been bound to the geographic scale of the selected study area, leading to scale-specific results. In this research, an attempt is made to lift this limitation and develop a hierarchical, scale-sensitive methodology that can identify the significant environmental stressors to the biological community at different scales. Sites with similar background environmental conditions are clustered using self-organizing maps (SOM). This is used to identify stressors which affect the biological community throughout the area of study - called environmental gradients or large-scale stressors. Subsequently, these clusters of similar observations (sampling sites) are progressively sub-divided using environmental variables with a significant but localized effect on the biological community - called small-scale stressors. A parent group of sites is split only when the resulting sub-groups have significantly different biological responses. At the end of this recursive sites decomposition procedure, the original set of observations is organized as a tree of environmentally homogeneous groups of observations characterized by unique biological responses to multiple stressors with different geographic extents. The developed hierarchical analysis methodology has been validated using a large-size dataset of environmental observations from the State of Ohio. Our results show that habitat degradation and increased nutrient loading are the large-scale stressors with a widespread impact in Ohio. Other stressors, such as heavy metals, pH or nitrate concentrations have significant albeit localized effects on biological integrity.     

厌氧序批式反应器产氢

以啤酒厂废水处理厂UASB中的厌氧污泥为种泥,葡萄糖为基质,研究了厌氧序批式反应器产氢。控制反应器内pH为4.0～4.5,温度为(36±1)℃,水力停留时间为8 h,当进水葡萄糖浓度为4 000 mg/L,容积负荷为12 kg/(m3.d)条件下,该厌氧序批式反应器实现了连续高效厌氧产氢。生物气中的氢气含量约为48%～53%,基质产氢率为1.1 mol/mol葡萄糖,COD去除率为15%～25%,最大比产氢速率为84.5 mol/(kg VSS.d)。液相末端发酵产物中乙醇和乙酸的含量占液相末端发酵产物总量的80%以上,表明该反应器内进行的是乙醇型发酵厌氧产氢。厌氧序批式反应器完全可以实现连续高效厌氧产氢,比较适用于日处理量较小的高浓度含糖废水。     

餐厨垃圾混菌发酵制备燃料乙醇

以校园餐厨垃圾为原料,利用根霉和枯草芽胞杆菌进行糖化预处理,再接种啤酒酵母发酵产乙醇。通过单因素实验,以乙醇产量为响应值,对发酵条件进行优化。实验结果表明:乙醇产量最佳的发酵条件为:当底料含水率为22.79%,啤酒酵母接种量为15%,30℃培养条件下,经过5 d发酵,乙醇产量最高可达到6.67%。选用餐厨垃圾丰富了燃料乙醇的取材途径,实现了原材料的多元化,采用微生物预降解原材料为实现高产乙醇奠定了基础。     

污水低氧脱氮机制及其应用研究进展

阐述了污水低氧脱氮的基本原理,即抑制或去除亚硝酸盐氧化菌(NOB),同时保留氨氧化菌(AOB),并保持其活性;探讨了污水低氧脱氮实现途径;详细介绍了几种典型的污水低氧脱氮工艺(短程硝化(SHARON)工艺、厌氧氨氧化(ANAMMOX)工艺、好氧反氨化(DEMON)工艺、低氧自养硝化反硝化(OLAND)工艺、甲烷营养型硝化反硝化工艺和亚硝酸盐型完全自养脱氮(CANNON)工艺)的应用研究进展;最后对污水低氧脱氮处理工艺的工程运用进行了展望.     

曝气条件对浸没式膜生物反应器内流场的影响

为深入研究流场动力学特性对浸没式膜生物反应器系统内膜面污染的控制,应用fluent软件对浸没式膜生物反应器内气液两相流动进行了三维数值模拟研究。采用标准k-ε湍流模型和欧拉多相流模型,考察了改变曝气条件对膜面气液速度场及气含率分布的影响。模拟结果表明,在相同曝气强度下,1 mm曝气孔径下膜面气液两相的速度增加较孔径2mm、3 mm的快;曝气孔径为1 mm时,膜面的液相速度随着曝气强度的增加逐渐增大;曝气孔径为1 mm时,曝气量为5.5m3/h所形成的漩涡区较大,膜面气含率值较高且分布较均匀,气液两相接触面积较大,膜面冲刷效果较好;模拟观察到反应器底部靠近壁面局部气含率较低,不利于活性污泥中微生物的生长,需要进一步优化曝气和反应器结构。     

垃圾堆放发酵机理与应用工艺研究

对垃圾的发酵机理进行了实验研究,对渗沥液的析出量及其酸碱度、堆酵后垃圾热值的变化以及堆内温度的变化进行了观测,并对堆酵过程的机理进行了初步分析,给出了垃圾堆酵应用工艺的建议.     

炭纤维载体固定床厌氧发酵启动运行效果实验

以开发高效率、抗冲击性能强的高浓度有机废水沼气发酵技术为目的,用传统的 UASB反应器作为对照,研究了以炭纤维为生物膜载体的固定床厌氧反应器的启动运行效果。反应器进口废水 COD 为 5 000 mg/L, 水力停留时间 (HRT) 由213 h 逐步缩短为35 h,进水有机容积负荷(OLR)由0.56 kg COD/ (m³·d)提到3.45 kg COD/(m³·d)。结果表明,固定床反应器厌氧发酵的效率比对照高,出水 pH 值也比对照稳定;运行到第 50 d 时,固定床厌氧反应器和对照的 COD去除率分别由第 7 d 的36.56%和33.58%上升到87.9%和62.6%;固定床厌氧反应器的容积比产气率最高为1.16 m³/(m³·d),累计产气量为415.59 L,而对照的容积比产气率最高值仅为0.31 m³ /(m³·d),累计产气量为 71.66 L,前者最高容积比产气率和累计产气量分别是后者的3.74倍和5.78倍。固定床厌氧反应器的启动速度、COD 去除率和产甲烷效率显著地高于对照反应器。     

一株产絮凝剂的黑曲霉的分离及培养条件优化

从活性污泥中筛选出一株产絮凝剂的霉菌,初步鉴定为黑曲霉(Aspergillus niger).其所产生的微生物絮凝剂对高岭土悬浊液具有良好的絮凝作用.通过培养条件优化,其所产生的微生物絮凝剂对高岭土悬浊液的絮凝率从85.6%提高到98.7%,实验结果表明,(1)黑曲霉孢子最佳接种量为9.33×108 个/L;(2)产絮凝剂适宜的碳源为蔗糖,氮源为尿素,用量分别为30.00、1.600 g/L;(3)最佳培养条件为:查氏液体培养基初始pH 7.0,培养温度30℃,摇床转速180 r/min,培养时间120 h;(4)在最佳培养条件下微生物絮凝剂的产量为1.805 g/L;(5)絮凝性能比较结果表明,微生物絮凝剂的絮凝性能优于传统絮凝剂.     

微生物絮凝剂有效真菌的筛选

通过真菌培养基（马铃薯培养基），对旱田土壤和活性污泥中的微生物进行筛选分离，得到3株絮凝率超过67％的菌株，其中絮凝率超过75％的高絮凝活性菌株1株——MZ52。将MZ52在产絮凝剂的培养基中进行发酵培养后，对1000mg／L高岭土悬浮液絮凝，得出MZ52菌产絮凝剂最佳培养条件，分别为摇床转速160r／min，培养时间90h，初始pH值为8．0，培养温度为40℃。