Microbial characteristics in anaerobic digestion process of food waste for methane production–A review

• Published in: Bioresource technology Vol. 248; no. Pt A; pp. 29 - 36
• Main Authors: Wang, Pan, Wang, Hongtao, Qiu, Yinquan, Ren, Lianhai, Jiang, Bin
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England Elsevier Ltd 01.01.2018
• Subjects: ammonia; Anaerobic digestion; Anaerobiosis; Bioreactors; cellulose; community structure; Fatty Acids, Volatile; Food; Food waste; hydrolysis; Methane; methane production; Microbial communities; microorganisms; pollution; social problems; starch; volatile fatty acids; Food waste; Methane; Microbial communities; Anaerobic digestion
• ISSN: 0960-8524; 1873-2976; 1873-2976
• DOI: 10.1016/j.biortech.2017.06.152

•First detailed review on microbial characteristics of anaerobic digestion (AD) of food waste in different conditions.•Discussed microorganism as indicator at stable and failure AD process.•Seeking efficient succession rules of the dominant microorganisms in different stage is needed. Food waste (FW) is rich in starch, fat, protein and cellulose. It is easy to decay and brings environmental pollution and other social problems. FW shows a high potential to produce methane by anaerobic digestion (AD) due to its high organic content. However, many inhibitors, such as accumulation of ammonia and volatile fatty acids (VFAs), usually result in inefficient performances and even process failure. Microorganisms play an important role in the process of hydrolysis, acidogenesis, acetogenesis and methanogenesis. This review provided a critical summary of microbial characteristics to obtain connects of microbial community structure with operational conditions at various states of AD, such as mesophilic and thermophilic, wet and dry, success and failure, pretreated or not, lab-scale and full-scale. This article emphasizes that it is necessary to analyze changes and mechanisms of microbial communities in unbalanced system and seek efficiency dynamic succession rules of the dominant microorganisms.