Resource-Oriented Wastewater Treatment through Quorum Quenching─Integration of AnMBR and Donnan Dialysis

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Aligned with United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 6, water treatment is shifting from pollution removal to resource recovery and circularity. An integration of AnMBR and a Donnan dialysis (DD) (AnMBR-DD) was proposed to simultaneously recover methane and ammonium, and quorum quenching (QQ) was further incorporated to mitigate membrane fouling and enhance process efficiency. The COD removal efficiency was stably maintained above 80%, and the methane conversion efficiency reached 51.6%. The effluent NH4+-N concentration was controlled at 3–5 mg/L, with a recovery efficiency of 47.1% in the AnMBR-DD. The QQ effectively alleviated biofouling on the ultrafiltration membrane in the AnMBR and ion exchange membrane in the DD, while improving methane production and ammonia recovery by 20.6% and 6.6%, respectively. These improvements were mainly attributed to QQ-induced reductions in extracellular polymeric substances (EPS), which weakened microbial adhesion and decreased biofilm compactness. Life cycle assessment showed that coupled methane and ammonium recovery in AnMBR-DD-QQ were the decided advantages in alleviating the environmental impact. These results highlight the great potential of AnMBR-DD-QQ as a resource-oriented wastewater treatment strategy.