About this Research Topic
Because of the current climate and environmental emergencies, a rapid shift from a take-make-dispose to a circular economy is required and waste products of different origins should be increasingly reused and recycled. Within this context, the exploitation of marine and freshwater microorganisms can contribute to mitigating aquatic pollution and (in the case of photosynthetic microbes) greenhouse gasses in highly industrialized areas. The main bottleneck of these bio-based processes is their poor economic viability compared to traditional approaches. To date, a large plethora of genomic and metabolomic data regarding living organisms and their metabolic changes related to the impact of pollutants, and the detoxification mechanisms are available. This is likely to improve our ability to restore polluted habitats, although studies at both small and large scales are required. This research topic intends to gather the most recent approaches towards environmental-friendly treatments based on accumulation or degradation of aquatic pollutants by microorganisms, as well as reduction of carbon dioxide and other flue gas components in the atmosphere. We believe that a collection of studies aimed at removing and eventually recycling most pollutants can contribute to improving our knowledge in bioremediation and habitat restoration.
We would like to set a collection on the advances in aquatic bioremediation of nutrients, hydrocarbons, heavy metals, microplastics, GHGs as well as other pollutants. We are seeking contributions aiming at:
(1) Improving our understanding of genetic and enzymatic mechanisms for the sequestration, detoxification, and/or degradation of pollutants
(2) Setting-up and evaluating pilot bioremediation plants at laboratory and pilot scale
(3) Scaling-up attempts of already validated approaches considering large flows of civil and industrial wastewaters and flue gasses pollutants
Studies based on aquatic microbes are welcome in this research topic. Both sequestration (heavy metals, GHGs) and degradation (hydrocarbons, plastics) processes, as well as innovative strategies and technologies to improve the efficiency of pollutants removal, will be considered.
Keywords: Heavy Metals, Hydrocarbons, Microplastics, Microbial Bioremediation, Aquatic Pollution, Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Pollution, One Health
Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.