Enhancement by the artificial controlled culture for the algal treatment of antibiotic ceftazidime: a three-step response performance and high-removal efficiency

Abstract

The improved activity of alga is critical for the biological enhanced treatment to remove contamination. Organisms usually perform compensatory responses, resulting from unfavorable conditions. This study investigates the effect of the artificially controlled culture before the treatment, which provoked the possible algal compensatory response and helped the algae to perform a better removal capability of the antibiotic ceftazidime in the subsequent treatment process. The removal efficiency could be improved up to 99.15% in 6 h when the algae were under the artificial controlled light conditions before the treatment process. In addition, higher removal efficiency of N and P (98.57% and 99.98%) was obtained after the artificial control. This suggests that the algae displayed a sequence of response during the exposure to the antibiotic after the artificial controlled culture in three steps: compensatory response, adsorption-consumption acceleration and acclimation. It might be the first time that the artificial conditions changing were controlled to improve the removal efficiency. Our study pointed out a new method for biological enhancement technologies in the antibiotic wastewater treatment.