1,720,963 research outputs found
Reuse of treated municipal wastewater for irrigation in apulia region: The “IN.TE.R.R.A.” project
No full textThe use of non-conventional water resources including treated municipal wastewater has been increasing in the Mediterranean regions over the last decades to cope with water shortages and uneven rainfalls due to climate change. The aim of this paper is to present the first results from two years of experimental field activities carried out in two different demo-places in Southern Italy: the municipal wastewater treatment plants of Noci and Castellana Grotte (Apulia region). In these sites different vegetable crops (cucumber, lettuce, melon, endive in Noci and fennel, lettuce, fennel in Castellana Grotte) were grown in succession and irrigated in parallel with treated wastewater and conventional water pumped from wells, for comparing the effects of the different water sources on soil and vegetables. Reclaimed water quality was monitored for chemical and microbial parameters and compared with conventional water. At harvesting time, microbial indicators were measured on edible part of crops and in soil. Results show that the effluents produced by a full scale membrane bioreactor (MBR) treatment plant (Noci) comply with the stringent Italian standards for reuse in agriculture, and its microbiological quality is higher than the conventional well water. In Castellana Grotte the effluent quality of the two pilot plants was different according to the adopted technologies (MBR and tertiary cloth filtration), and sometimes depended on the quality of incoming wastewater. As for the agronomic results, in both sites crop yields were higher in the plots irrigated with treated wastewater, and the microbial indicators Escherichia coli and Salmonella were never found, at harvesting time, on edible parts of crops and in the soil
Innovative Membrane Bioreactors for Advanced and Sustainable Wastewater Treatment
No full textIn the context of the circular economy and sustainability goals, there is a pressing need to recover valuable resources, such as clean water, biofuels, and biofertilizers, from wastewater. Membrane bioreactor (MBR) technology has emerged as a leading solution for advanced wastewater treatment, ensuring high removal efficiency for both conventional and emerging contaminants while also enhancing resource recovery. Despite the considerable advantages of MBRs over conventional treatment technologies, membrane fouling remains a significant challenge. This phenomena leads to increased energy consumption and the frequent need for physical and chemical cleanings, resulting in increased operating costs and indirect greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Therefore, enhancing membrane fouling mitigation strategies can yield substantial benefits for efficient, sustainable, and carbon-neutral wastewater treatment. To tackle these challenges, the next-generation of MBRs must integrate advanced technologies. This study evaluates the performance of both conventional and novel MBRs in municipal wastewater treatment, focusing on the removal efficiency of both conventional and emerging contaminants, including microplastics, as well as membrane fouling propensity. Experimental activities utilized both conventional membranes alongside self-forming dynamic membranes (SFDMs), including the innovative Living Membrane® (LM®) technology. The findings demonstrate that the use of LM® effectively mitigate membrane fouling while maintaining comparable efficiency in contaminant removal to that of conventional membrane
Improving Recovery of Valuable Bio-Products from Sewage Sludge Using Innovative Membrane Technologies
No full textMembrane bioreactor (MBR) technology has been employed in sewage sludge treatment within polyhydroxyalkanoate (PHA) production systems to tackle challenges like sustainable recovery of volatile fatty acids (VFA) and achieving high-quality effluent. Typically, MBRs utilize pressure-driven membranes, mainly ultrafiltration (UF) membranes. Despite its advantages, membrane fouling remains a significant hurdle, particularly when scaling up from laboratory-scale to pilot and full-scale plants. Living Membranes® (LM) offer a novel approach to self-forming dynamic membranes (SFDM), relying on the formation of a stable layer of sludge particles, organic compounds, and microorganisms between a cost-effective supporting materials. LM® reframes membrane fouling from a drawback to a key part of the treatment process. Being composed of organic materials, the encapsulated layer within LM® serves as both a carbon source and a nutrient trap, promoting microbial growth and ensuring high contaminant removal. This abstract presents insights from the application of pilot-scale ultrafiltration membrane bioreactor (UF-MBR) and Living Membrane® bioreactor (LMBR) for PHA production. The UF-MBR and LMBR technologies have been compared under both anaerobic conditions, aimed at VFA production via sewage sludge acidogenic fermentation, and aerobic conditions, mainly focused on the removal of contaminants. Preliminary results suggest that LM® offers a sustainable and efficient alternative to conventional UF membranes in sewage sludge treatment, potentially enhancing the recovery of valuable resources such as clean water, VFAs, and PHA
Closing the water cycle in the agro-industrial sector by reusing treated wastewater for irrigation
No full textReuse of treated wastewater for crop irrigation can contribute to mitigate water stress, especially in Mediterranean countries. The use of reclaimed municipal wastewater for this purpose was demonstrated by numerous studies and full-scale installations. On the other hand, reuse of industrial effluents in irrigation is uncommon and the knowledge in this field is limited.
This work aims at assessing the suitability of agro-industrial effluent reuse for irrigation. In the case study presented, a full-scale tertiary treatment based on membrane ultrafiltration and UV disinfection was tested at an agro-industrial site in Apulia (Italy). The wastewater treatment plant processed the stream produced at a vegetable canning factory, and the treated effluents were used for field scale irrigation tests. The variability of wastewater quality and its effects on treatment process performances and reclaimed water quality were investigated. An economic evaluation of the full scale tertiary treatment was also performed. The results showed that the adopted technologies effectively removed suspended solids and the faecal indicator Escherichia coli below the local standards for reuse in irrigation. Furthermore, the use of treated agro-industrial wastewater had no inhibitory effects on the growth of tomato and broccoli, neither resulted in any faecal contamination of crops. In general, the present study shows that reuse of
treated wastewater for irrigation is a suitable practice to close the water cycle in the agro-industrial sector. This is very important in areas where the sustainability of agriculture and transformation activities depends on the water available for irrigation. This practice also avoids
the discharge of pollutants into water bodies, reducing the environmental impacts of agro-
industrial productions
Metaproteomics Applied to Activated Sludge for Industrial Wastewater Treatment Revealed a Dominant Methylotrophic Metabolism of Hyphomicrobium zavarzinii
No full textIn biological wastewater treatments, microbial populations of the so-called activated sludge work together in the abatement of pollutants. In this work, the metabolic behavior of the biomass of a lab-scale plant treating industrial pharmaceutical wastewater was investigated through a metaproteomic approach. The complete treatment process included a membrane biological reactor (MBR) coupled with an advanced oxidation process (AOP) for partial breakdown of non-biodegradable molecules. Proteins from biomass samples collected pre- and post-AOP application were investigated by two-dimensional gel electrophoresis (2DE), mass spectrometry (MS), and finally identified by database search. Results showed that most proteins remained constant between pre- and post-AOP. Methanol dehydrogenase (MDH) belonging to Hyphomicrobium zavarzinii appeared as the most constantly expressed protein in the studied consortium. Other identified proteins belonging to Hyphomicrobium spp. revealed a predominant methylotrophic metabolism, and H. zavarzinii appeared as a key actor in the studied microbial community
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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