Assessing three industrially produced fungi for the bioremediation of diclofenac

Abstract

Diclofenac is an emerging pollutant: toxic, persistent, and bioaccumulative, present in several environmental niches in a concentration of parts per million. This pharmaceutical’s biological removal was reported with various fungal species, showing promissory results. This work aimed at diclofenac removal by individually challenging the fungal species Pleurotus ostreatus, Aspergillus niger, and Penicillium roquefortii but triying to lower the biosorption nature of cell walls by NaCl addition. P. ostreatus removed 100% of the initial diclofenac concentration, whereas A. niger and P. roqueforti removed 74% and 32%, respectively. In all three cases, biosorption by polar interactions was negligible. We demonstrated that stressful environments, such as mineral media, force the fungus to take advantage of its metabolic tools to survive, hence showing higher removal capacity when limiting growth conditions. Bioremediation is an excellent alternative to give residual fungal biomass a secondary use.

Keywords:

• Emerging pollutants
• mycoremediation
• analgesic removal
• biosorption
• diclofenac removing activity proteins

Acknowledgments

We thank José Miguel Carrizales Torres for the technical support during this investigation; the Authors also thank researchers Martha Dolores Bibbins-Martínez for kindly donating the P. ostreatus strain. This work was supported by CONACYT 257616.

Data availability statement

The data supporting this study’s findings are available from the corresponding author, [Pérez-Martínez AS], upon reasonable request.

Disclosure statement

The authors reported no potential competing interest.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.