Abstract
This investigation was focused towards examining the potential of Ganoderma lucidum IBL-05 and Phanerochaete chrysosporium IBL-03 co-culture for bioremediation of textile industry effluents. The screening of single and co-inoculated cultures was carried out for 10 days on 4 industrial effluents of different colors collected from Sitara textile industry (SIT), Nishat textile industry (NIT), K&N textile industry (KNT), and Cresent textile industry (CRT) of Faisalabad. The co-culture gave maximum decolorization results (48%) for SIT effluent. The decolorization process for SIT was optimized, and almost complete decolorization (98.4 %) of the effluent could be achieved with the co-culture, within only 3 days after incubation at pH 3.5 and 35 degrees C using 5 ml inoculum as well as fructose and urea as carbon and nitrogen sources, respectively, in 15:1 ratio, and MnSO4 as mediator. The co-culture produced all the 3 major ligninolytic enzymes, namely, manganese peroxidase (1223 IU/ml), lignin peroxidase (569 IU/ml) and laccase (102 IU/ml). The analysis of the treated effluent for COD, BOD, formaldehyde and nitroamines showed that all the toxicity parameters were below the permissible limits of non-toxic reusable water.