Energy & Fuels, Vol.32, No.12, 12495-12500, 2018
Electric Field Assisted Technology for Improving the Screening and Application of a Thiophene-Biodegrading Strain
For the screening of functional strain and biodegradation, two devices of electric field assisted screening (EFAS) and electric field assisted biodegradation (EFAB) were developed in the current work. Candida tropicalis CZ12 capable of thiophene degradation was enriched and isolated from oily soil by the EFAS device at a voltage range of 10-14 v. In EFAB, the thiophene degradation velocity of this strain was accelerated by an assisted electric field, and it could reach 74% at 2 h in aqueous thiophene solution. Furthermore, the removal efficiency of the continuous EFAB device for treating thiophene-containing model fuel was 79.76% under the following conditions: aqueous-hydrocarbon ratio of 5:1, electric field assisted voltage of 15 V, and residence time of 120 min. It was clear that the above advantages of EFAS and EFAB were conducive to facilitating applications in biorefractory organics.