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Today, fossil carbon provides us with fuels (energy), polymers (packaging, insulating and building materials, household utensils, glues, coatings, textiles, 3D-printing inks, furnitures, vehicle parts, toys, electronic and medical devices, etc.) and biologically active substances (drugs (Chapter 9), flavorings, fragrances, food additives, plant protection products, etc.). In this chapter we discover the modern materials of our civilization which are very often polymers derived from oil. They are referred to as “plastics” (annual world production: 380 × 10⁶ tons). Their production consumes 8% of the crude oil extracted (ca. 5 billion tons per year). An increasing part of the plastics originates from renewable resources (less than 10% today, see Section 11.10, bio-sourced plastics). Plastics make life easy for us, but at the underestimated cost of damage to our environment (Figure 8.1) and our health. They contaminate the hydrosphere and the agricultural soil. The atmosphere is also contaminated by microplastics…

Man has always used his environment to heal himself. Until 1869 all medicines came mainly from plants (e.g. opium for pain relief, Figure 8.46, Section 8.8.1) or animals (e.g. badger skin and meat to relieve snake or scorpion bites). In 2010, there were 1000 active ingredients in drugs sold in pharmacies, of which 10% were unmodified natural products, 29% were derivatives of natural products (hemisynthesis) and 61% were synthetic products. Using bio-informatics and artificial intelligence methods, an estimated 166 billion different molecules can be prepared by combining 17 atoms comprising C, N, O, S, F, Cl, Br and I, and by applying known synthesis methods and standard stability criteria. By applying medicinal chemistry criteria (structure/biological activity relationships) to this molecular space called GBD17, it is estimated that 10 million of these molecules could become drugs…

The sun is the only source of renewable energy available to us, if geothermal energy is not taken into account. In the form of radiation (UV light, visible light, infrared light, Section 1.1) it sends us annually 178,000 terawatts (1 TW = 10¹² W; unit of power 1 W = 1 J s^–1 = 859.85 calories per hour), that is to say 15,000 times the energy consumed annually by humanity. Only 0.1% of the solar energy received by planet Earth is converted into plant biomass, i.e. 100 × 10⁹ tons per year which corresponds to ca. 180 × 10⁹ tons per year of CO₂ captured from the atmosphere. This CO₂ returns to the biosphere after the death of the plants. Consumption of fossil carbon emits ca. 35 × 10⁹ tons of CO₂ yearly. Biomass is the material produced by all living organisms (plants, animals, microorganisms, fungi)…

The ability of the fungus Fusarium moniliforme to degrade phenol, catechol, 2,4-dichlorophenol and their mixtures was investigated in the present study. The biodegradation studies were performed in a liquid medium with the phenolic compounds as a sole carbon and energy source. It was found that temperature of 25 oC was optimal for 100% degradation of phenol, 2,4-dichlorophenol and catechol in concentration of 1.0 g/L. In case of mixtures of phenols in concentration of 1.0 g/L phenol + catechol was degraded 100 %, phenol + 2,4-dichlorophenol - 55% and 2,4- dichlorophenol + catechol only 35 %. Our study shows that investigated phenols were metabolized by the β-ketoadipate pathway, through ortho-fission of catechol.

In this study one hundred and forty seven strains of actinomycetes from urban and industrial wastewater treatment plants with foaming problems were isolated and identified by using phenotypic and genotypic procedures. The chemotaxonomic tests and the analysis of the sequences of gene 16S rRNA showed that the isolated belonged to the genera Corynebacterium, Dietzia, Gordonia, Mycobacterium, Rhodococcus, Tsukamurella and Williamsia. Biodegradation assays were carried out in three different mineral media supplemented with phenol and naphthalene as sole carbone source. The catalysis of the aromatic ring was confirmed by PCR of gene catA, which encodes cathecol 1,2-dioxygenase. The amplified catA genes were sequenced. It is shown with this study that residual wastewater treatement plants can be a good source of microorganisms with many potential applications, such as bioremediation and biodegradation.

Sixteen strains of filamentous fungi were isolated from soil samples collected from Livingston Island, Antarctica. The isolates’ taxonomic identifications were performed based on morpho-dimensional parameters following the most suitable identification keys for the different genera. The affiliation of the investigated strains was established to the particular genera. The obtained fungal isolates were members mostly to the genera Penicillium, Aspergillus and Cladosporium. All strains were studied for their ability to adapt to aromatics containing media. Most of the investigated strains demonstrated good tolerance to the presence of 0.5 g/l phenol in the culture medium. More than that the investigations showed that strains were able to grow in a culture medium containing phenol in concentrations varying form 0.1 to 0.7 g/l as a single source of carbon and energy. The experiments carried out with hydroxyl-, methyl- and nitro- phenol derivatives revealed the capability of some of the strains to grow and utilize various of these aromatic compounds. The strains Aspergillus sp. AL1, Aspergillus sp. AL8, Aspergillus AL9, Aspergillus sp. AL15, Penicillium sp. AL5 and Penicillium AL11 were able to grow and utilize as a sole carbon sources 0.3 g/l of each examined aromatic compound. There were not found strains able to utilize any of the tested nitrophenols. The representatives of Cladosporium as well as strain Lecanicillium sp. AL12 did not show any capability to degrade phenol derivatives.

The Fe₂O₃ nanoparticles have been prepared by the co-precipitation and followed by calcination process. The as-prepared Fe₂O₃ nanoparticles were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), energy-dispersive X-ray analysis (EDS), and X-ray diffraction (XRD). Catalytic wet air oxidation of phenol with molecular oxygen using the Fe₂O₃ nanoparticles catalyst at different temperatures has been studied. The results showed that the catalytic activity of the Fe₂O₃ nanoparticles for phenol degradation can be increased with increasing the temperature, and the degradation of phenol catalyzed by the Fe₂O₃ nanoparticles fits the first-order kinetics.

In this paper, the HAP synthesized powders as an adsorbent containing phenolic hydroxyl group as an adsorption target, examine the HAP powder in aqueous solution adsorption property so as to explore the possibility of HAP powder as a novel phenol adsorbent compounds results showed that: nano HAP powder for phenol adsorption equilibrium with the increasing concentration of phenol increase in the concentration of 160mg/L basically reached saturation adsorption, adsorption capacity reached 10.92mg/g, its research phenolic wastewater treatment will provide a reference.

Prepare lead alkoxide complex in ethylene glycol solution with electrochemical method. Add cereus nitrate into electrolyte, hydrolyze and dehydrate it. And then roast it for 2h in 500℃, Nanoscale PbO₂/CeO₂ powder can be formed finally. Nanoscale PbO/CeO₂ powder will be characterized by infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), thermogravimetry-differential thermal analysis (TG-DTA), x-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscope (SEM). The experiment shows that particle dispersion of nanoscale PbO₂/CeO₂ powder formed in the organic solution is ideal with particle size 100-150nm. Study redox behaviors of nanoscale PbO₂/CeO₂ electrodes in 0.15mol/LHCl+0.1mol/L C₆H₅OH solution with the method of cyclic voltammetry. The results show that oxidation peak current of nanometer PbO₂ mingled with CeO₂ electrode reaches 107.5mA/cm2 and removal rate of photocatalytic degradation of phenol can reach 91.7%, which show that electrode is of excellent electrocatalytic activity.