Abstract
For the purpose of development of non-toxic and biodegradable flocculant, chitosan complex was isolated from Ganoderma lucidum wastes. The isolated complex was identified as the expected chitosan-glucan complex by IR specta. The complex was extracted by treatment of 50% NaOH solution at 120$\circ$C for 5 hrs, namely optimal condition and solubilized with 2% acetic acid for fur-ther use as flocculant. Preliminary experiments showed that the solubilized complex had higher flocculation activity of 1.3 fold than commercial chitosan at 400 mg/l concentration in soybean curd wastewater. Also the solubilized complex removed 83% of MLSS and 60% of COD in the soybean curd wastewater treated by photosynthetic bacteria, 50% of turbidity and 21% of MLSS in sugar industry wastewater, and 90% of turbidity and 89% of MLSS in alcohol fermentation wastewater. Bacterial cell flocculation activities of the solubilized chitosan-glucan complex were 89% in Bacillus subtilis broth, 81% in Streptococcus lactis broth, and more than 90% in Escherichia coli broth after standing for 2 days. The results reveal that chitosan-glucan complex from Ganoderma lucidum wastes can substitute for commercial chitosan as non-toxic and biodegradable flocculant.