biodegradation ofpolybrominated diphenylethers inliquidmedia and sewage sludge by trametes versicolor

polybrominated diphenyl ethers (pbde) are widely employed as flame retardants and constitutea group of emerging pollutants of high persistence. the degradation of different pbde commercial mixtures(penta-, octa- and deca-bde) by the white-rot fungus trametes versicolor under aerobic conditions wasstudied. this work demonstrates the capacity of t. versicolor to degrade three different pbde commercialmixtures in aqueous phase, obtaining final removal efficiencies of 87±6, 85±13 and 67±7% for deca-, pentaandocta-bde mixtures (and minimal degradation of 73±5, 38±13, and 28±7%), respectively. the intracellularenzymatic complex cytochrome p-450 is proposed as the enzyme involved in the first step of deca-bdedegradation by t. versicolor. in an effort to assay the application of the fungus in real contaminated matrices,the study successfully demonstrated the ability of t. versicolor to degrade pre-existent deca-bde fromsewage sludge in a solid-phase treatment, reaching 86% elimination at the end of the process. the findingssupport the potential use of the ligninolytic fungus in bioremediation of pbde.