Comparative study of single cultures and a consortium of white rot fungi for polychlorinated biphenyls treatment

BENITEZ, S.F.; SADAÑOSKI, M.A.; VELÁZQUEZ, J.E.; ZAPATA, P.D.; FONSECA, M.I.

JOURNAL OF APPLIED MICROBIOLOGY

WILEY-BLACKWELL PUBLISHING, INC

Año: 2021

1364-5072

Aims: To evaluate the mycoremediation of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) by eithersingle cultures or binary consortia of Pleurotus pulmonarius LBM 105 and Trametes sanguineaLBM 023.Methods and Results: PCBs tolerance, removal capacity, toxicity reduction andligninolytic enzyme expression were assessed when growing single culture and binary consortiumof fungus in 217 mg l−1 of a technical mixture of Aroclor 1242, 1254 and 1260 in transformer oil. A decrease in tolerance and variation in ligninolytic enzyme secretion were observed inPCB-amended solid media. P. pulmonarius LBM 105 mono-culture was able to remove up to 95.4% of PCBs, while binary consortium and T. sanguinea LBM 023 could biodegrade about 55 %after 24 d. Significant detoxification levels were detected in all treatments by biosorptionmechanism.Conclusions: P. pulmonarius LBM 105 in single culture had the best performanceregarding PCBs biodegradation and toxicity reduction. Ligninolytic enzyme secretion changed inco-culture.Significance and Impact of the Study: The evaluation of PCBs bioremediationeffectiveness of basidiomycetes consortium in terms of PCB removal, toxicity and ligninolyticenzyme production to unravel the differences between using individual cultures or consortium hasnot been reported. The results from this study enable the selection of P. pulmonarius LBM 105mono-culture to bioremediate PCBs as it showed higher efficiency compared to binary consortiumwith T. sanguinea LBM 023 for potential decontamination of PCB-contaminated transformer oil.