Bioremediation of Petroleum-Based Contaminants by Alkane-Degrading Bacterium Alcanivorax borkumensis
Abstract
The world’s dependence on petroleum hydrocarbons has led to significant environmental implications. For example, oil spills cause lasting environmental damage, and the increase of plastics in the marine environment has been growing, specifically, microplastics that can be difficult to detect due to their small size. Petroleum hydrocarbons occur naturally in nearly all marine environments, which has allowed hundreds of microorganisms to evolve to utilize these hydrocarbons as their primary energy source. These microbes are classified as hydrocarbonoclastic and are utilized to remove spilled oil biodegradation. Over the last ten years, progress has been made in the biodegradation of oil spills by introducing nanoparticles to facilitate the proliferation of these hydrocarbonoclastic species near the oil-water interface. There is an immediate need to understand the interaction between hydrocarbonoclastic bacteria and nanomaterials. Understanding how nanoparticles may enhance the bioremediation of oil spills is vital. We call this new field nano-enhanced bioremediation. Increasing the understanding of how nanoparticles enhance bioremediation will lead to major advancements in nano-enhanced bioremediation as a sustainable alternative to traditional oil spill cleanup methods. Furthermore, the interaction of nanomaterials and bacteria lays the groundwork for understanding the interaction of micro-and nanoplastics and bacteria, where research is currently lacking. During this course…
Read the paper
Related studies
- Green Chemistry: A Framework for a Sustainable Future
- Nano/micro-plastic, an invisible threat getting into the brain
- Emerging contaminants antibiotic resistance genes and microplastics in the environment: Introduction to 21 review articles published in CREST during 2018–2022
- Water Resources and Sustainable Development
- Nano- and microplastics in the workplace
- Water Enclosure and World-Literature: New Perspectives on Hydro-Power and World-Ecology
Go deeper in Evidence Hub
Evidence Hub adds a study data sheet (design, sample size, evidence level, key numbers), an AI summary and a chat grounded in the paper's text.