Di-
n-butyl phthalate is widely used as plasticizer,
which has been listed as priority pollutant due to its
toxic and ubiquitous characteristics. It is difficult to remove
by the conventional wastewater treatment processes. In this
paper, the feasibility of using
Micrococcus
sp. to bioaugment
a sequencing batch reactor for degrading di-
n-butyl
phthalate (DBP) was investigated. The terminal restriction
fragment length polymorphisms (T-RFLP) were used to
analyze the variation of microbial community in the reactor.
The experimental results showed that for the bioaugmented
reactor, the removal efficiency of DBP was about
85 % as compared to 25 % of the control reactor when
initial DBP concentration was 100 mg/L. The bioaugmentation
not only enhanced the removal efficiency of
target compound, but also shortened the start-up time of the
reactor. The kinetics of DBP degradation conformed to the
first-order model in both reactors. The T-RFLP analysis
indicated the bacterial community changes in the acclimated
activated sludge and the introduced
Micrococcus sp.
during the operational process.
