ABSTRACT:Arsenic is a ubiquitous element in the environment and occurs naturally in both organic and inorganic forms. Under aerobic condition, the dominant form of arsenic in waters is arsenate, which is highly mobile and toxic. Arsenic poisoning from drinking water remains a serious world health issue. There are various standard methods for arsenic removal from drinking waters (coagulation, sorption, ion-exchange reactions or methods of reverse osmosis) and alternative methods, such as biosorption. Biosorption of arsenic from natural and model waters by native or chemically modified (with urea or ferric oxyhydroxides) plant biomass prepared from sawdust of Picea abies was studied. The kinetic of the adsorption process fitted well the pseudo second order adsorption model and equilibrium was achieved after 2 h. The results showed that biosorption was well described by both Langmuir and Freundlich isotherms. The maximum biosorption capacity of the sawdust modified with ferric oxyhydroxides, evaluated by Langmuir adsorption model, was 9.259 mg/g, while the biosorption capacity of unmodified biosorbent or biosorbent modified with urea was negligible. The adsorption capacity is comparable to results published by other authors, suggesting that the prepared chemically modified biosorbent has potential in remediation of contaminated waters.

The quantification of arsenic biovolatilization by microscopic filamentous fungi Aspergillus clavatus, A. niger, Trichoderma viride and Penicillium glabrum under laboratory conditions is discussed in this article. The fungi were cultivated on a liquid medium enriched with inorganic arsenic in pentavalent form (H 3 AsO 4 ). Filamentous fungi volatilized 0.010 mg to 0.067 mg and 0.093 mg to 0.262 mg of arsenic from cultivation systems enriched with 0.25 mg (5 mg.l −1 of arsenic in culture media) and 1.00 mg of arsenic (20 mg.l −1 of arsenic in culture media), respectively. These results represent the loss of arsenic after a 30-day cultivation from cultivation systems. The production of volatile arsenic derivatives by the A. niger and A. clavatus strains was also determined by hourly sorption using the sorbent Anasorb (CSC) on the 29th day of cultivation.

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. Biovolatilization and biosorption have a great potential for bioremediation of contaminated localities. However, results showed that not all fungal species are effective in the removal of arsenic. Thus, more work in this research area is needed.

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