Electro-bioremediation of wastewater: Transitioning the focus on pure cultures to elucidate the missing mechanistic insights upon electro-assisted biodegradation of exemplary pollutants

Abstract

Electro-bioremediation of exemplary water pollutants such as nitrogenous, phosphorous, and sulphurous compounds, hydrocarbons, metals and azo dyes has already been studied at a macro-scale level using mixed cultures. The technology has been generally established as a proof of concept at the technology readiness level (TRL) of 3, and there are already specific cases where the technology reached TRL 5. However, this technology is less utilized compared to traditional approaches. Although, mixed cultures result in high electro-biodegradation efficiency, their use hinders process' mechanistic insights which are better determined through pure cultures studies. This knowledge can lead to improved technologies. Therefore, this manuscript focuses on the specific pollutants' electro-biodegradation by pure cultures, assessing the availability of information regarding genes, enzymes, proteins and metabolites involved. Furthermore, studies characterizing the dominant genera or species are assessed, in which the available information at molecular level is evaluated. In total, less than 40 studies were found which were predominantly focused on the electro-biodegradation potential rather than the mechanistic insights. This highlights a gap in the field featuring a motivation to transitioning the focus on the study of pure cultures to unravel the mechanistic insights. Therefore, specific actions are suggested. Characterization of the mixed cultures followed by microorganisms isolation is crucial. Thus, electroactive and biodegradation characteristics will be revealed using omics, genome annotation and transcriptional kinetics. This can lead to optimization at the microbiological level through genetic engineering, synthetic biology, mathematical modelling and strategic building of co-cultures. This research focus offers new avenues for sustainable wastewater treatment.