초록
The objective of this study was to develop a mechanistically based mathematical model that would consider the interdependence of VOCs transport, microbial activity, and sorptive interactions in a moist, unsaturated soil. Because the focus of the model was on description of natural attenuation, the advective VOCs transport that is induced in engineered remediation processes such as vapor extraction was not considered. The utility of the model was assessed through its ability to describe experimental observations from diffusion experiments using toluene as a representative VOCs in well-defined soil columns that contained a toluene degrading bacterium, Pseudomonas putida G7 md Fl, as the sole active microbial species. The gas-liquid mass-transfer was found to be a key parameter controlling the ability of bacteria to degrade VOCs. This finding indicates that soil size and geometry are likely to be important parameters in assessing the possible success of natural attenuation of VOCs in contaminated unsaturated soils. Therefore we found that Pseudomonas putida G7 and Fl were very effective to remove of refractory pollutants such as toluene in soil by Bio-filter
