Biological aspects of anaerobic digestion and its kinetics: An overview

Abstract

Anaerobic digestion is an anoxic microbiological process occurring in natural environments. Though, the process is considered to be the oldest, its concept relies on the fourth generation biofuel for direct sequestration of carbon-di-oxide into methane. However, the process is successful in natural environments in the efficiency of methane yield with compared to pilot or industrial scale. An overview of an anaerobic digestion and its kinetics is detailed in this review for the successful digestion process, which includes microbiological process, methanogenic interactions, operational conditions of the digester, substrate requirements and its limitation, substrate enhancement by pretreatment and co-digestion process and other rate limiting parameters affecting the process in order to increase the efficiency of methane production.