A Review on Biodegradation of Phenol from Industrial Effluents

The environment, as a consequence of industrial and agricultural revolutions, tends to harden with potentially carcinogenic and mutagenic halogen-substituted aromatic compounds. Phenol and its higher molecular homologues are dangerous environmental pollutants. Due to their toxic character, these molecules tend to accumulate in water and soil after being discharged without an adequate treatment. Physical and chemical methods have been designed to remove phenol from effluents but many of these methods are commercially impractical either because of their high operating costs or because of the difficulty encountered in treating the solid wastes generated. In recent years, Biodegradation has been studied as an alternative technology, one of the most efficient and cost effective waste treatment technologies available to industries. Treatment of polluted sites or waste streams can be performed by using systems, in which the number of desirable microorganisms increase because they proliferate at the expense of contaminants. In the present work, detailed description of the properties, sources, hazards, physico-chemical methods, microbial degradation, phenol degrading microorganisms, degradation methods, metabolic pathway and analysis are presented. It has been found that phenol degradation by Pseudomonas putida has been widely adopted as preferred alternative. Jr. of Industrial Pollution Control 24 (1) (2009) pp 1© Enviromedia Printed in India. All rights reserved Address for correspondence : Chandana Lakshmi, Email : [email protected]