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Abstract

Quality of water is a vital issue that can affects the health impact of humans through pollution. Aquatic environment via anthropogenic and natural activities is of optimum concern. Hence, there is need to provide cost effective and environmentally eco-friendly technique of bioremediation. This study explored the absorption efficiency of living cells of zoogloea layer, moss and mushroom as bio-indicators to monitor pollution in aqueous solution contaminated with cadmium, lead, zinc and nickel. The microorganisms indicated appreciable abilityto survive in the heavy metals contaminated aquatic environment through homeostatic mechanism functions in the microbial cells to maintain mass balance for effective biological activities. The incubation processes were carried out in bio-treatment set up over a period of 48 hrs, 96 hrs and 144 hrs (2,4 and 6 days) at different varying metal concentrations. Zoogloea layer and moss showed higher retention capacity for Pb²⁺ and Cd²⁺ than mushroom because they are capable of metabolizing xenobiotics which makes the metals less toxic and remove the ions from solution. About 70% to 90% of the contaminated solutions that were analysed can be removed by living cells of the studied biomass materials. On the basis of the maximum absorption capacity, the order of affinity of the metal ions for the studied microorganisms was Ni ²⁺>Zn ²⁺ >Cd ²⁺ >Pb ²⁺ . These results suggest that zoogloea layer, moss and mushroom can successfully treat heavy metals concentrated solutions.

Keywords: Bioremediation; Zoogloea layer; Moss; Mushroom; Bio-degradable