Journal of Agricultural Science and Food Research
Open Access

Abstract

Phycoremediation of Some Pesticides by Microchlorophyte Alga, Chlorella Sp.

Mervet H Hussein, Ali M Abdullah, Eladl G Eladal and Noha I Badr El-Din

Every year, pesticides are found in surface and ground waters in Egypt. Pesticides are uncommon usage and applied in high amounts in agricultural activities. The present study investigated the possible removal of some herbicides from water using the microalgae Chlorella vulgaris Microorganisms are capable of decomposing a range of organic pollutants and the main focus in previously published studies has been on bacteria and fungi. Microalgae are microorganisms that have different morphological, physiological, and genetic traits that confer the ability to produce different biologically active metabolites. Because of the high capacity of microalgae in biosorbing heavy metals, most of their studies concentrated on this advantage, but fewer studies reported the removal of organic pollutants such as pesticides. The experiments were conducted as the following; the first was long-term experiment (5 days) using growing cells, and the second was short-term experiment (60 min) using dead and living cells. In the long-term experiment, the presence of growing algae resulted in removal percentages of pesticides ranged from 87% to 96.5%, while in the short-term study, the presence of live algae cells led to removal percentages ranged from 86 to 89% and dead algae biomass achieved removal ranged from 96% to 99%. The main mechanism behind the removal of pesticides in the water phase is proposed to be biosorption onto the algal cells. This conclusion is based on the short duration required for removal to occur.