While some biofilms can contain dangerous bacteria, others can contain beneficial microbes that promote remediation of contaminated water and soils. They assist in metal mining and can play an important natural role in the recycling of material on Earth.
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Mining metals
As you probably know, mining for precious metals of various kinds (gold, silver, copper and so forth) is a messy job. when mining metals, the desired metal is not generally found in nice, big, pure chunks. The largest gold nugget ever found was reputed to weigh about 70 Kilograms. But most gold, as with all […]
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Beverages
It is very important to remember that although microorganisms are necessary to manufacture the below beverages, unwanted biofilms in brewing pipelines can lead to serious spoilage and consistency problems. List of microorganisms used in beverage preparation (provided by Wikipedia) Microorganism Type Beverage Acetobacter cerevisiae bacterium beer Acetobacter fabarum bacterium coffee Acetobacter tropicalis bacterium coffee Aspergillus […]
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Dairy waste
The dairy industry produces yogurts, cheese, ice-cream and butter in addition to milk, and dairy industry waste generated by these processes must be treated. The residues produced during these transformation processes, combined with large water consumption needs means that the dairy industry produces a lot of wastewater; 4 – 15 L of water can be […]
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Oil spills
Oil spills are a rare but environmentally devastating occurrence, so developing new bioremediation – the removal of residues from oil spills at sea and on land, is vitally important. Crude oil is refined into many different products, from light products that evaporate easily such as diesel to heavy residues that are very persistent like bunker […]
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Waste water treatment
The application of biofilm technology in wastewater treatment originated from the industrial operation of trickling filters in the early 1880s in Wales, Great Britain. Modern biofilm processes in wastewater treatment can be divided into two categories: (1) The fixed-medium systems where the biofilm media are static in the reactors and the biological reactions take place […]
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Chemical production
Beneficial biofilms are used in all types of bioreactor as they are simple, more productive, and surfaces that support biofilm growth are available at reasonable cost. In industrial bioreactors two types of biofilms are commonly used Biofilms that grow onto supports such as charcoal, resin, bonechar, concrete, clay brick, or sand particles, and Biofilms that are […]
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Food
Biofilms in food production can be useful at different stages, such as during food preparation and fermentation. This has significant effects on the quality and flavour of fermented foods. For example, acetic acid bacteria form biofilms during strawberry vinegar fermentation to survive and produce acetic acid. List of microorganisms used in food preparation (provided by […]
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Microbial fuel cells
Microbial fuel cells use bacteria to convert organic waste into electricity. The microbes live on the surface of an electrode and transfer electrons onto it, ultimately creating a current. Fundamental to the functioning of a microbial fuel cell is the formation of highly specialised bacterial biofilms on the electrode surface. While many different bacterial species […]
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Bioremediation
Bioremediation by bacteria in biofilms can target a number of pollutants. Examples of pollutants that can be degraded by biofilms: BTEX (Benzene, Toluene, Ethylbenzene, Xylene) PAH (Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon) Nitroaromatic compounds PCB (Polychlorinated biphenyls) Chlorinated aliphatic compounds Heavy metals (Cd, Cu, Pb…) Nuclear wastes Agricultural chemical wastes (Triazine, DDT) Biofilms are used in treating wastewater, […]