Isolation of Enterobacteria able to degrade simple aromatic compounds from the wastewater from olive oil extraction

Summary Enterobacteria growing on wastewater from olive oil extraction were selected. Among this microflora, strains of Klebsiella oxytoca and Citrobacter diversus able to degrade simple monomeric aromatic compounds were isolated by enrichment culture of the effluent lacking simple sugars. In this preliminary investigation, the phenolic acids tested on solid and liquid media were gentisic, protocatechuic, p-hydroxybenzoic, benzoic, vanillic and ferulic. It was shown that the biodegradation of an aromatic acid is tightly dependent on both the type and the position of the radical substituted on the aromatic ring. Citrobacter was the most efficient strain in metabolizing ferulic acid in liquid medium at a concentration of 1.5 g/l. The substrate biodegradation yield achieved exceeded 86%.