Bioremediation of Lindane Contaminated Soil by Pleurotus ostreatus in Non Sterile Conditions Using Multilevel Factorial Design

A commercial strain of the fungus Pleurotus ostreatus was used to mediate the degradation of lindane, by landfarming technology during a 4 weeks statistical experiment. The Multilevel Factorial Design was used with two design factors, namely, straw content X (1) (%) and lindane content X (2) (ppm). The optimization parameters (responses) investigated were: biodegradation rate Y (1) (mu g d(-1)), biomass growth rate Y (2) (mg d(-1)), biodegradation/biomass Y (3) (mu g mg(-1)), total organic carbon Y (4) (%), total organic nitrogen Y (5) (%) and total organic carbon/total organic nitrogen Y (6). The optima of the adequate models obtained for the period of 2 and 4-weeks were found. An overall kinetic study, conducted in this work with the aid of experimental design, determined the optimum (maximum) specific lindane degradation rate to be 0.16 g kg(-1) month(-1).