Bioremediation of Textile Disperse Dyes using White-Rot Fungi Trametes gibbosa

The current study focuses on the biodegradation of disperse textile dyes and studies enzymes involved in degradation process. Various textile dyes are used in textile industry to dye different fabrics and polyesters. During the dyeing process, most of the dyes are not adsorbed and washed into the wastewater which affects the marine system and, ultimately, human health. Microorganisms like white rot fungi (WRF) have great potential of biodegradation of dyestuffs due to their active, nonspecific lignolytic catalytic systems. In this study, the white-rot fungi Trametes gibbosa was employed. The targeted disperse dyes were Disperse Blue-I and Disperse Red-I which are widely used in textile industries. The fungus were cultured on different media, and various biochemical parameters were optimized. Maximum growth of T. gibbosa was observed under optimized biochemical conditions (30 oC temperature, pH 6, 2% carbon source, 1% inoculum size and media peptone dextrose agar (PDA)). The decolonization process was optimized by using different concentrations of disperse dyes and wastewater. T. gibbosa show maximum degradation after 6 days incubation against disperse Red1 and disperse Blue1at the concentration of 0.02% (absorbance of 1.56 to 2.98), 0.01% (absorbance 0.22 to 2.87), respectively. The fungus showing maximum degradation at 2% wastewater concentration, with absorbance values ranging from 0.61 to 0.84. The addition of readily available carbon and nitrogen sources further enhanced the degradation efficiency. The overall efficiency of fungi was found to be more than 80%. The study concluded that T. gibbosa is a potential microorganism for the treatment of industrial effluents. The fungus also has potential for the production of active degrading enzymes such as laccase and lignin peroxidase. Further research is recommended to overexpress these enzymes, used purified enzymes to biodegrade diverse textile harmful and carcinogenic industrial effluents.