Influence of anoxic selectors on heavy metal removal by activated sludge

The goal of this research is to compare the metal binding characteristics of an anoxic selector activated sludge system and a conventional activated sludge system. Metal biosorption by biomass harvested from experimental systems was determined by a series of batch experiments. Heavy metals studied in this research were zinc, cadmium, and nickel. The sorption isotherm showed that the selector sludge had significantly higher sorption capacity than did the control sludge. Metal biosorption behavior closely followed a Freundlich isotherm model for equilibrium concentrations. ECP contents of biomass estimated by alkali extraction technique showed that ECP levels in the selector sludge significantly higher than that in the sludge harvested from the conventional system, indicating that the higher metal sorption capacity of selector sludge may be due to the selection of the ECP-producing bacteria (i.e., Zoogloca sp.) by the selector system.