Abstract
Cadmium is a heavy metal found in nature almost always along with zinc. Its most common oxidation state is the +2 and despite its natural occurrence, this element is among the major toxic heavy metals. The removal of Cd2+ from wastewater may be performed by biosorption, which is a physical-chemical process based on various mechanisms such as absorption, adsorption, ion exchange, precipitation and complexation. As a biotechnology branch, biosorption should remove or recover organic and inorganic substances from solutions through biological material, which may include dead microorganisms and their components like seaweeds, plant material, as well as industrial, agricultural and natural wastes. Another way of removing metal ions from wastewater is through bioaccumulation. In this process, microorganisms, algae, plants, and others have also demonstrated the capacity of removing toxic compounds. There are few studies in the literature that associate biossorptive processes to bioaccumulants, or even that study potential increase in the removal of metal ions from aqueous solutions. Thus, this research proposal aims to study the removal of Cd2+ ions from solutions by using biosorbent such as mercerized sugarcane bagasse, with and without association of living cells of bacterial strain Ensifer meliloti (LBMP-C02). This project focus on increasing knowledge about the use of sugarcane bagasse in bioremediation processes besides their association with bioaccumulation by living cells of bacterial strain, reaching a formulation to be applied in further studies on large-scale processes. (AU)
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