Cadmium uptake by unicellular green microalgae

Bioremoval, the use of biological species for the removal of metal ions from polluted waters, has the potential for achieving greater performance at lower cost than conventional wastewater treatment processes. The bioremoval capabilities of microalgae have been extensively studied in the past, but mainly in a non-mathematical way. Algae have the ability to concentrate metal ions from aqueous solutions; hence a knowledge of the alga-metal interaction is important both commercially and environmentally. A mathematical model previously developed in the Department of Chemical Engineering, Monash University, has been successfully used to describe the uptake of cadmium by two algae, Chlorella pyrenoidosa and Chlamydomonas reinhardtii, as well as by Chlorella vulgaris, the species used in the model's development.