Kinetics and characteristics of phenanthrene degradation by a microbial consortium

Abstract

The kinetics and characteristics of phenanthrene degradation by a microbial consortium W4 isolated from Henan Oilfield were investigated. The degradation percentage of solid phenanthrene at 200 mg/L in liquid medium after 6 days of incubation was higher than 95% under the condition of 37 °C and 120 r/min by this microbial consortium. The degradation of phenanthrene could be fitted to a first-order kinetic model with the half-life of 1.25 days. The optimum conditions for degradation of phenanthrene by consortium W4 were as follows: temperature about 37 °C, pH from 6.0 to 7.0 and salinity about 8.0 g/L. It was concluded that microbial consortium W4 might degrade phenanthrene via both salicylic acid and o-phthalic acid pathways by analyzing products with GC-MS. © China University of Petroleum 2008.