Arsenic Removal from Aqueous Media using Scenedesmus obliquus: the Promoting Impact of Microalgae-Bacteria Consortium

The present study was conducted to investigate efficacy of unicellular microalga Scenedesmus obliquus either as solo culture or in combination with the bacterium Shewanella sp in removal of arsenic from aqueous media. For this purpose, pure culture of the microalga was fed with arsenic solution and removal rate was monitored. Moreover, impact of pH, temperature and initial biomass was studied. In the second phase, a consortium of S. obliquus- Shewanella was prepared and used to investigate the effect of bacterium presence in terms of removal enhancement. The results showed that pH 7.0, temperature of 29 oC and initial biomass of 0.8 g/L caused the highest rate of arsenic removal. Comparison of pure culture of S. obliquus and S. obliquus- Shewanella consortium revealed that the latter significantly enhanced removal efficacy.