The Role of Microbes in Bioremediation of Radioactive Wastes

Abstract

The world is currently undergoing rapid development in industrialization in various industries such as chemical industry, textile industry, nuclear power plant. They release effluents that contain harmful substances (U235, Cs137, and other compounds) that are released in the environment and cause contamination. Also, due to nuclear disaster such as Chernobyl and Fukushima large amount of radioactive substances was spread and cause harmful effects on living organisms and environment, so it is necessary to maintain and manage the disposal of radioactive waste by treating it with physical, chemical, biological methods for the management of radioactive waste. Microbial remediation is the best method and carried out by different mechanisms such as bioaccumulation, biosorption, biotransformation, biosolubilization, bioprecipitation, chelation, and complexation.