Oxygen aerobic respiration rate

SRB, a diverse group of anaerobic bacteria isolated from a variety of environments, use sulfate in the absence of oxygen as the terminal electron acceptor in respiration. During biofilm formation, if the aerobic respiration rate within a biofilm is greater than the oxygen diffusion rate, the metal/biofilm interface can become anaerobic and provide a niche for sulfide production by SRB. The critical thickness of the biofilm required to produce anaerobie conditions depends on the availability of oxygen and the rate of respiration. The corrosion rate of iron and copper alloys in the presence of hydrogen sulfide is accelerated by the formation of iron sulfide minerals that stimulate the cathodic reaction. 

It is important to note that the amount of oxygen needed to avoid sulfate-reducing conditions is determined by the aerobic respiration rate of the wastewater and the biofilm and not the potential amount of total sulfide production in the sewer. The relatively low solubility of oxygen (9-11 g02 m-3) in wastewater compared with the DO consumption rate typically requires that oxygen must be injected at several points of a sewer pipe to ensure aerobic conditions. This is, of course, expensive and requires manpower in terms of operation and maintenance. Furthermore, the readily biodegradable and fast hydrolyzable fractions of the organic matter may be depleted (Tanaka et al., 2000b). In the case of requirement for mechanical treatment, this is positive ... 

Continuous culture systems of aerobic treatment are likely to be more cost effective since in steady state conditions the respiration rate and hence oxygen requirement, remain constant. This report describes the effects of mean treatment time, treatment temperature and dissolved oxygen level in aerobic continuous culture systems on the removal of odorants from piggery slurry and on the heterotrophic oxygen demand during treatment. 

This model was first applied to dissolved oxygen gas (O2) profiles to estimate the rate of aerobic respiration. This biological process is responsible fiar the presence of a pronounced mid-depth O2 concentration minimum in the mid- and low latitudes throughout all the ocean basins. The concentration minimum in the Atlantic can be seen in Figure 4.l4e. The solution to Eq. 4.14, in the presence of an upward vertical advection, is... 

The balance between relative rates of aerobic respiration and water movement were considered in Section 4.3.4. We saw that a subsurfece concentration minimum, the oxygen minimum zone (OMZ), is a common characteristic of vertical profiles of dissolved oxygen and is produced by in situ respiration. Waters with O2 concentrations less than 2.0 ppm are termed hypoxic The term anoxic is applied to conditions when O2 is absent. (Some oceanographers use the term suboxic to refer to conditions where O2 concentrations fall below 0.2 ppm but are still detectable.) As illustrated by Figure 4.21b, this water column is hypoxic in the OMZ. The dissolved oxygen concentrations are presented as % saturations in Figure 4.21c. With the exception of the mixed layer, the water column is undersaturated with respect to dissolved oxygen with the most intense undersaturations present in mid-depths. Surface supersaturations are the result of O2 input from photosynthesis and bubble injection. 

The dissolved oxygen data follow depth trends that are nearly a mirror image of the nutrients. The OMZ lies at depths slightly above the core of the AAIW. Why is the OMZ located at these depths To answer this question, oceanographers use the vertical concentration profiles of O2, nutrients, and TDIC to assess the relative rates of aerobic respiration and photosynthesis as a function of depth. (The TDIC concentration is used as a measure of how much CO2 has been taken up from or released into the water.)... 

Anaerobic conditions often develop in hydrocarbon-contaminated subsurface sites due to rapid aerobic biodegradation rates and limited supply of oxygen. In the absence of O, oxidized forms or natural organic materials, such as humic substances, are used by microorganisms as electron acceptors. Because many sites polluted by petroleum hydrocarbons are depleted of oxygen, alternative degradation pathways under anaerobic conditions tend to develop. Cervantes et al. (2001) tested the possibility of microbially mediated mineralization of toluene by quinones and humus as terminal electron acceptors. Anaerobic microbial oxidation of toluene to CO, coupled to humus respiration, was demonstrated by use of enriched anaerobic sediments (e.g., from the Amsterdam petroleum harbor). Natural humic acids and... 

Even if rate measurements in sediments are made using whole core incubations, e.g., when the inhibitor is a gas, it is still difficult to obtain a depth distribution of the rate (usually, an areal rate is obtained). A sophisticated measurement and model based system that avoids direct rate measurements has been used to overcome this problem. Microelectrodes, which have very high vertical resolution, are used to measure the fine scale distribution of oxygen and NOs" in freshwater sediments. By assuming that the observed vertical gradients represent a steady state condition, reaction-diffusion models can then be used to estimate the rates of nitrification, denitrification and aerobic respiration and to compute the location of the rate processes in relation to the chemical profiles (e.g., Binnerup et ai, 1992 Jensen et ai, 1994 Meyer et ai, 2001 Rysgaard et ai, 1994). Recent advances and details of the microelectrode approach can be found in the Chapter by Joye and Anderson (this volume). 

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