If you design a phosphate bioreactor, get copyright protection for your intellectual property. It will make you rich.
Donovan's Nitrate Destroyer
- Thread starter djbon
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If you design a phosphate bioreactor, get copyright protection for your intellectual property. It will make you rich.
While I can not find the scientific papers, it has been shown that when bacteria are stressed with low oxygen conditions they uptake phosphate at a higher ratio than when growing under aerobic conditions. When sufficient oxygen levels return, bacteria resume normal growth but do not give back this elevated phosphate. Schneider, a German industrial waste water company, uses the process for municipal waste water plants.
Go luck on your phosphate bioreactor.
Go luck on your phosphate bioreactor.
djbon
New member
Might take hundred years to materialised:lol2:
djbon
New member
Maybe i should test the effluent for disolved oxigen level. But i read somewhere that P04 uptake by bacteria is way lower compared to N03. Me myself is struggling with PO4 at this moment.
Yes, I would consider testing for dissolved oxygen levels. If it is sufficiently high >10ppm consider reducing the input flow rate which should consume more oxygen and stress bacteria. In turn, the ratio of phosphate to nitrate uptake should increase. Do not leave in this condition steady state or you will kill anaerobic bacteria in reactor, requiring more frequent addition of bacteria. Stressing bacteria with low oxygen conditions, requiring more frequent bacteria dose may prove to be your elevated phosphate solution.
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djbon
New member
I tested adding another element in my normal vodka solution and I'm seeing improvement on PO4 uptake after 2 weeks. The algae on my rocks is turning light green and no longer looks puffy. PO4 test at effluent output is undetectable. Will continue monitoring the situation. Cheers
I tested adding another element in my normal vodka solution and I'm seeing improvement on PO4 uptake after 2 weeks. The algae on my rocks is turning light green and no longer looks puffy. PO4 test at effluent output is undetectable. Will continue monitoring the situation. Cheers
Now I am curious what the element that you added to your solution is ... perhaps Iron Citrate?
Also phosphorus accumulating bacteria tend to lag behind the growth of denitrifying bacteria, so you may want to take this into consideration before concluding the observed effect on PO4 is as a result of the change to your carbon source.
Dennis
Dactylopterus
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What is that element you added to help with the po4 reduction?
djbon
New member
Sorry, can't reveal the ingredient as Subsea had mentioned, i could be a millionaire if the design works as phosphate reactor as well
. But in serious note, it too premature to claim anything at this moment. Cheers :beer:It has been twenty years since I was involved in industrial waste water treatment. To enhance phosphate uptake by bacteria, these aerobic bacteria were stressed with low oxygen. When oxygen levels were brought back up, bacteria maintained higher phosphate levels.
Hmm, this comment is interesting. Are you saying that stressing aerobic bacteria causes them to exhibit Phosphorous accumulation behaviour and become higher in phosphate composition than they would under typical conditions?
Lately I have been thinking about a statement by the DyMiCo folks about their filters being able to sequester PO4, but not actual export it, and that typical PO4 reduction methods (GFO) would still be required at some point. That the bacteria themselves would be the PO4 sink makes a lot of sense.
Dennis
Yes, the bacteria are the phosphate sink. Schreiber patented the process to stress these aerobic bacteria to uptake more phosphate and become the phosphate sink. Then these bacteria are drained from cone settleling basins and sent to drying beds, after which this dry sludge is spread onto pasture land for beneficial reuse on agriculture crops.
djbon
New member
I have seen several case studies saying that without oxygen available, certain anaerobic bacteria strain will use phosphate instead of nitrogen together with carbon as energy source. Some even suggested that a proper combination of ethanol, acetic acid and sugar are far more superior in combating nitrate and phosphate rather than dosing single type of carbon. Is this true?.
Interesting concept. Sorry Donovan, I don't mean to hijack your thread, but I hope you will agree that this could have applications in your application as well. Especially if there was some way for you to control the ORP level in your tower (like an ORP probe) to be able to cycle the from a baseline oxygen level to a low oxygen state and then remove a replaceable substrate to "export" the phosphate laden bacteria.
Dennis
djbon
New member
Dennis, no problem at all. I think my reactor does reached anaerobic condition as nitrate is totally absent at the effluent output. Previously dosing carbon is purely vodka, but the last few weeks I tried combination of pure ethanol, acetic acid and that currently secret element (all lab grade) diluted in distilled water. Percentage was suggested by a biologist, a good friend of mine. Phosphate is no longer detectable and algae is receding, greenish algae covering my sand is getting less as well.
I like the idea of being able to have the bacteria accumulate more PO4 than they typically would. That would improve their nutrition to the corals and at the same time being able to keep the water column more nutrient poor, at least as far as unbound nutrients that often drive nuisance pets like GHA and Cyano.
Donovan your system would most likely be a source of bacteria plankton much like the DyMiCo filters are said to do. Although with them, they recommend you not use a protein skimmer to preserve the plankton in the water column for the corals.
I often wondered how they are able to operate that way (with no export for anything other than NO3), but perhaps if they are able to keep more of the PO4 sequestered in the plankton, than the corals could be the export ... or at least a desirable (hopefully) long term nutrient sink.
Dennis
Donovan your system would most likely be a source of bacteria plankton much like the DyMiCo filters are said to do. Although with them, they recommend you not use a protein skimmer to preserve the plankton in the water column for the corals.
I often wondered how they are able to operate that way (with no export for anything other than NO3), but perhaps if they are able to keep more of the PO4 sequestered in the plankton, than the corals could be the export ... or at least a desirable (hopefully) long term nutrient sink.
Dennis
