Title: A comparative study of biosorption of Cu using Aspergillus niger and Aspergillus flavus

Authors: M. Jena; D. Pradhan; T. Das

Addresses: Department of Applied and Industrial Microbiology, Utkal University, Bhubaneswar, India. ' Nano Engineering Division, School of Engineering, Chungnam National University, Daejeon 305-764, South Korea. ' Institute of Minerals and Materials Technology, Bhubaneswar 751 013, India

Abstract: In the present work a comparative study has been made to adsorb Cu ion from solution using pre-treated biomass of two fungal strains, Aspergillus niger and Aspergillus flavus. Several parameters such as pH, adsorbate and adsorbent concentration and fraction size of the fungal biomass were studied to observe their effect on the percentage of metal uptake by the treated biomass. Although both the fungal strains proved to be potential biosorbents, but novel observation was, under similar experimental conditions Aspergillus flavus showed better biosorption properties than Aspergillus niger. Overall experimental data fitted well to both Freundlich and Langmuir adsorption isotherm models.

Keywords: biosorption; fungal adsorption; metal adsorption; copper adsorption; Aspergillus niger; Aspergillus flavus; pre-treated biomass.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEWM.2012.046388

International Journal of Environment and Waste Management, 2012 Vol.9 No.3/4, pp.221 - 231

Published online: 13 Dec 2014 *

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