Mycoremediation of Synthetic Dyes: An Insight into the Mechanism, Process Optimization and Reactor Design - Microbial Degradation of Synthetic Dyes in Wastewaters - page 20

Majority of the reports available on this aspect indicate the optimum pH for
fungal growth to be in acidic range as well as in mesophilic range. On the contrary,
the pH of the dye ef

uent usually lies in the alkaline range and is released from the
industry at high temperatures. Therefore, for a biological process to be effective at
the industrial scale, it is important that the selected microbe should be able to grow
in alkaline pH and to withstand high temperatures as well. Apart from containing a
mixture of dyes, the ef uent contains many other compounds, i.e. salts which can

interfere with the process of dye removal. Thus, in addition to the studies with
single dye solution, removal of dye mixtures and the effect of dye auxiliaries and
validating the ef

uent should be taken up.
Also, in order to ensure commercial application in remote industries, it is
important to develop the seed culture in a form which can be easily transported and
stored without requiring much energy inputs. Recently, attempts have been made to
develop a carrier based microbial formulation for remediation of heavy metals and
dyes from wastewater (Sharma 2009 ; Kaushik 2011 ; Mishra 2013 ).

ciency of the isolates in real ef

8 Conclusion

Synthetic dyes are widely used in textile, dyeing, tanning, food and paper industries
and are released into the environment through waste waters coming out from these
industries. A lot of research has focused on mycoremediation of synthetic dyes
which could offer an attractive decentralized system. A critical assessment of the
recent studies indicates that a strong foundation of an ef cient mycoremediation

process can be laid by meticulously choosing fungal strains tolerant to high pH,
temperature and salt concentration, and designing consortiums of such strains with
variable mechanisms of dye sequestration. This could be the

rst step to ensure a
reliable process performance. Further, the process cost, inputs, rates and dye uptake
capacities can be optimized through statistical process optimization tools that help
ascertain interactive effect of several process variables. Signi

cant advancements
have been made in the area of appropriate bioreactor designs which need to be
testi ed at pilot scales. Further, integration of physico-chemical techniques with

mycoremediation offers a novel approach for handling synthetic dyes. Nevertheless,
more efforts must go in to address the need for user-friendly formulated products (of
robust fungal strains/consortium) as well as fate of dye laden fungal sludge to
establish the mycoremediation tool as eco-friendly process.

Acknowledgments Financial assistance from Department of Science and Technology, Indian
Council of Agricultural Research, Government of India and CSIR Senior Research Fellowship and
Research Associateship to one of the authors (PK), are gratefully acknowledged.