Simultaneous adsorption and bioaccumulation: A study on continuous mass transfer in column reactor

Zinc sequestering bacteria VMSDCM accession number HQ108109, was immobilized on particles of Cedrus deodar sawdust in continuous column reactor. The bacterium seemed to cluster up with arsenite oxidizing bacteria when plotted in a maximum likelihood tree. The rough texture of the immobilized bacterium indicated the presence of tremendous area on the cell surface. The uptake capacities obtained at saturation and break points for a flow rate of 109 mL/h were 21.33 (g/g) and 19.53 (g/g) at 33.90 g/L of zinc. The uptake capacities at saturation and break points were 58.30 (g/g), and 54.33 (g/g) at an initial concentration of 70.20 g/L of zinc, respectively. The insignificant values of error functions (SSE and χ2) indicated the collateral relationship between experimental and theoretical values of uptake capacities. The physical process parameters like bed height, flow rate, and initial metal ion concentration have shown significant impact on forced convective mass transfer of metal ions in packed bed column studies.