The Role of Microalgae in Wastewater Treatment

This book deals with the most emerging aspects of algal research with special reference to microalgae viz; diversity, mutations, genomics and metagenomics study, eco-physiology, culturing, microalgae for food and feed, biofuel production, harvesting of microalgae, separation, and purification of biochemicals, techno-economical assessment, microalgal biotechnology, algal-bacterial systems for wastewater treatment. It describes the complex issues associated with the above-mentioned areas with the intervention of cutting-edge biotechnological tools and techniques like next-generation sequencing methods, metabolomics, and bioreactor design and development. The chapters provide past developments, current information and future prospects of algal technology as an alternate avenue for waste water treatment and its potential for production of biofuel and nutraceuticals.

Prof. Sukla is at present research professor in Multi-Disciplinary Research Cell, Siksha 'O' Anusandhan University, Bhubaneswar, India. He has worked as Chief Scientist and is heading the Bioresources Engineering Department in CSIR-IMMT, Bhubaneswar, India. He has more than 40 years of R&D experience in the area of Bio-mineral Processing, Hydrometallurgy, Algal biotechnology and has contributed over 176 research articles in International & National Journals in the area of biological science and other related fields. Further, he has published 4 books and has 11 patents. Under his guidance, seven students have been awarded the Ph.D. degree. Prof. Sukla is the recipient of several prestigious awards including Prof. S.R. Vyas Memorial Award for the year 2010 by Association of Microbiologists of India (AMI) towards his significant contribution to the Development of Microbiology in India, IIME Mineral Beneficiation Award: Academic /R&D for the year 2009 for his outstanding professional contribution to Mineral Engineering and Sita Ram Rungta Memorial Award-2007 of the Society of Geoscientists and Allied Technologists (SGAT) for the year 2007 for outstanding work in the field of bio-mineral processing. He is the Editorial board member of Scientific Reports, World Environment journal (Scientific & Academic Publishing) and International Journal of Nonferrous Metallurgy. He has become senior editor INGLOMAYOR magazine, Santiago (CHILE). He is the National Expert in Envis Centre on Environmental Biotechnology. Prof. Sukla has implemented different projects from Alcoa, USA, Ministry of Mines, DST, DBT, and MOEF of Govt. of India, and OMC, Govt. of Odisha. He has also served as Emeritus Scientist, CSIR, Emeritus Professor, AcSIR, New Delhi.

Dr. Enketeswara Subudhi, an alumnus of IIT, Kharagpur is currently working as Associate Professor in The Center of Biotechnology, Siksha 'O' Anusandhan University, Bhubaneswar, India. He was awarded visiting fellowshipby DST-SERB, New Delhi. He was designated as biopesticide expert to the government of Orissa by DFID. He has been handling various externally funded projects supported by DST and DBT, New Delhi. Dr. Subudhi has worked with the rural community for livelihood generation through biotechnology transfer. He was invited by Chinese academy of Science to present his research findings at Dalian, China. He has been working in Microbial Genomics and Metagenomics of environmental samples like hot springs, functional genomics based establishment of the mechanism behind the multi-drug resistance in clinical isolates, isolation, and characterization of bioactive principles in medicinal plants.  He has published approximately one hundred articles in journals, book chapters, and seminars and submitted 83 new gene and genome sequences to the public databases.

Dr. Debabrata Pradhan is presently working as Assistant Professor in the Biofuels and Bioprocessing Research Center of Siksha ‘O’ Anusandhan (Deemed to be University), Bhubaneswar. He received his PhD from Chungnam National University, Daejeon, South Korea, in 2011. After completing his PhD, he worked as Postdoctoral Research Fellow in different institutions like Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources (KIGAM) and Chungnam National University, South Korea. He is an expert in algal technology, wastewater treatment, ceramic materials synthesis, fuel cell, solid waste management, leaching (chemical and bio), and solvent extraction. He has more than 40 SCI journal publications and 1 granted patent to his credit. He is a life member of various professional societies.