DEGRADATION OF BENZENE USING RHIZOSPHERIC BACTERIA

Abstract

Rhizoremediation is considered as an environmental friendly technique to deal with the contamination of petroleum hydrocarbons. The current study aimed to check the potential of indigenous soil micro-organisms to degrade benzene. Soil samples were collected from petroleum-contaminated sites near Attock Oil Refinery, Rawalpindi, Pakistan, by brushing off the soil from roots of Cannabis sativa. The soil was processed for isolation of indigenous microbial strains. Sixteen bacterial strains isolated from the soil were screened for their potential to grow using benzene as sole carbon source. The strains were subjected to degrade 1000 mg/L benzene using M9 media. 16S rRNA gene sequencing was carried out for the potential performing strains. Pseudomonas aeruginosa (SAR-1) was the promising degrader with 85% degradation in 72 hours followed by Bacillus cereus (SAR-2) and Acinetobacter junii (SAR-3) with 83 and 70% degradation efficiency, respectively. A phylogenetic tree was developed by using TREEVIEW program to explore the lineage of better performing strains. These efficient degraders may be used as consortium for degradation of different compounds.