Skip to main content
U.S. Department of Energy
Office of Scientific and Technical Information

Cell density and non-equilibrium sorption effects on bacterial dispersal in groundwater microcosms

Technical Report ·
OSTI ID:6719633

The relative importance of dispersion, physical straining, nonequilibrium sorption, and cell density on the dispersal of bacteria was examined in saturated, flow-dynamic sand columns. The bacterial breakthrough as a result of different size distributions of sand particles was followed by measuring the effluent concentration of (3)H-adenosine-labelled cells of a Bacillus sp. and an Enterobacter sp. strain suspended in ground-water. The breakthrough curves were compared with theoretical curves predicted from an advective-dispersive equilibrium sorption model (ADS), an ADS model with a first order sink term for irreversible cell reactions, a two-site model (equilibrium and nonequilibrium sorption sites), and a filtration model. Bacterial sand:water isotherms were linear in the experimental concentration range but had positive intercepts. The partition coefficients ranged from 15 to 0.4 for the Bacillus sp., and 120 to 0.4 for a Pseudomonas sp., and decreased with increasing particle size of the dominant fraction. In a kinetic study, the partition coefficient for the Enterobacter sp. in the smaller particle sand was 63 after one hour, but had decreased to 9 after 19 hours.

Research Organization:
Rice Univ., Houston, TX (United States). Dept. of Environmental Sciences and Engineering
OSTI ID:
6719633
Report Number(s):
PB-93-141505/XAB; CNN: EPA-R-812808
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English