Fungi: An approach to treat wastewater

Abstract

Current global environmental issues raise unavoidable challenges for the use of natural resource. Environmental pollution is turning into global issue in which water pollution is a serious concern, since water is used for different purposes. Now-a-days, supplying the human population with clean water is becoming a problem. Several industrial processes causing the production of large amount of toxic and stable pollutants and releases as wastewater. The disposal of these contaminated effluents into receiving waters can cause environmental damages. Therefore tanneries/ other allied industries are constrained to treat their effluents in order to minimize the negative impact on environment. The main reason for treating wastewater is to prevent the spread of diseases and safeguarding water sources against pollution. The development of efficient wastewater treatment technologies and circular economic approaches is thus become increasingly important. Treatment of wastewater is one of the strategies for the management of water quality. Due to some drawbacks over the years concerning chemical treatment, biological treatment is now employed to avoid the unpleasant conditions in natural water resources. Treating the wastewater using microbes and discharge into natural water bodies is the best idea to maintain the environment safely. Fungal microorganisms are used in the remediation process due to its low cost, fast growth, easy cultivation and eco-friendly properties. The immobilization of the fungus could allow the use of the system repeatedly, with obvious advantages from a further application point of view. Self-assembled fungal pellets have great potential in wastewater treatment because they are easily separated from dye-containing wastewater, and exhibit good decolonization properties and strong acid/base tolerances during the culturing and adsorption processes.