Many of the current methods of assessing anaerobic biodegradability of solid samples require sample modification prior to testing. Steps like sample drying, grinding, re-drying and re-grinding to 2mm or less make the test results difficult to apply to field conditions and could lead to oxygen exposure, possibly distorting the results. Finally, because of a small sample size of about 10-50g w/w, the test result may not be representative of the bulk material. A new tool dubbed ‘tube’ has been developed, made of 10 cm diameter PVC pipe measuring 43.5 cm long with 3600 ml capacity with caps at both ends. For easy sample introduction, one endcap is fixed while the other is screw capped. A distinctive feature is the wide neck opening of about 10 cm where solid samples can be introduced as is, without further sample modification. Research has proven the tube applicable across various types of solid organic waste and conditions provided that a suitable organic loading rate is determined. The tube is best operated using 5-7 days pre-digested digested sewage sludge as seed, with minimal mixing and without the addition of nutrients or alkali solution. The test result can be obtained within 4-6 days to 20 days, signifying a 50-75% and 95% substrate degradation, respectively. Irreproducibility seen in some experiments may not only be a function of the seed and the substrate. The organic loading rate (OLR) at which the test is conducted is also influential especially if test is conducted closer to its maximum OLR tolerance where anaerobic process is more erratic. The performance of a continuous reactor digesting on a similar substrate can be estimated using this new tool. Food waste is established by the tubes to have an ultimate methane potential (B0) of 0.45L CH4/g VS. The same substrate when digested in a continuous reactor will produce about (B) 0.32 L CH4/g VS. The first order rate constant for both systems; batch and continuous are identical at 0.12 to 0.28 d-1. First order kinetics is efficient at modelling the anaerobic degradation when the process is healthy but may be less reliable under an unstable process. This research recommends the use of kinetics in combination with the experimental data (e.g. HRT, OLR, yield) when planning and designing an industrial plant to avoid overdesign and unnecessary building, maintenance and operating costs.

Despite significant vector control advancements in the past years, the current malaria trends suggest that new control strategies are urgently required. These new approaches should address the current frontline intervention challenges like increasing insecticide resistance in mosquitoes and residual transmission issues. Insecticide-treated livestock (ITL) is one of the novel potential strategies to overcome the above challenges. ITL involves treating livestock near humans with an insecticide like ivermectin (IVM) to kill zoophagic malaria vectors. However, ivermectin pharmacokinetics data suggests that most IVM-administered drugs remain intact, and more than 90 % of this drug is eliminated in feces. Biological metabolites: 3′′-O-demethylivermectin (3DI) and 24-hydroxymethyl ivermectin (24OHI) are also excreted in feces. Therefore, using manure from treated cattle as fertilizers contaminates the soil, ground, and surface water with IVM or its metabolites through leaching and hydraulic water flow affecting the soil and aquatic ecosystems. Contemplating the contamination impacts, these drugs' environmental fate and effects could be regarded before massive IVM applications. Many researchers have tried to address this subject in temperate regions compared to the tropics, where IVM is urgently needed. Regional discrepancies such as soil types and climate can independently and dependently determine the fate and impact of ivermectin. Our research investigates the environmental fate of IVM and its primary biological metabolites. Laboratory and field studies in Tanzania and Virginia were conducted to simulate the difference between tropical and temperate climates. Soil and soil-manure mixture spiked with IVM were layered into two 5 mm layers in columns exposed to natural sunlight. The remaining IVM and its primary metabolite were quantified using Liquid Chromatography with a tandem mass spectrometry detector (LC-MS/MS. These compounds degraded up to 1.5 times faster in Tanzania than in Virginia, depending on temperature, soil depths and type, organic matter, and soil moisture. When IVM is subcutaneously injected into cattle, drug residues and metabolites: 3DI and 24OHI are excreted in feces following a positive skewed Poisson distribution profile. IVM, 3DI, and 24OH were found to degrade rapidly when cattle pats when exposed to the field. Since we conducted our study in the Summer, no IVM or its metabolites leached into the soil beneath. The obtained half-lives suggest that ivermectin's massive drug administration has little to worry about, primarily when the dung from treated cattle is spread into the field in thin layers in the Summer before farm application. / Doctor of Philosophy / Despite significant vector control advancements in the past years, the current malaria trends suggest that new control strategies are urgently required. These new approaches should address the current frontline intervention challenges like increasing drug resistance in mosquitoes and residual transmission issues. Treating cattle with ivermectin is one of the novel potential strategies to overcome the above challenges. This strategy is effective because the amount of ivermectin (IVM) found in the blood of treated cattle is enough to kill malaria vectors feeding on them. However, the literature suggests that most IVM-administered drugs remain intact, and more than 90 % of this drug is eliminated in feces. Metabolite bioproducts: 3″-O-demethylivermectin (3DI) and 24-hydroxymethyl ivermectin (24OHI) are also excreted in feces. Therefore, using manure from treated cattle as fertilizers contaminates the soil, ground, and surface water with IVM or its metabolites through leaching and hydraulic water flow affecting the soil and aqua ecosystems. Contemplating the contamination impacts, these drugs' environmental fate and effects could be regarded before massive IVM applications. Many researchers have tried to address this subject in temperate regions compared to the tropics, where IVM is more needed. Regional discrepancies such as soil types and climate can independently and dependently determine the fate and impact of ivermectin. Our research investigates the environmental fate of IVM and its primary bioproducts. Laboratory and field studies in Tanzania and Virginia were conducted to simulate the difference between tropical and temperate climates. Soil and soil-manure mixture spiked with IVM were layered into two 5 mm layers in columns exposed to natural sunlight. The remaining IVM and its primary metabolite were quantified on the appropriate instrument. These compounds degraded up to 1.5 times faster in Tanzania than in Virginia, depending on temperature, soil depths and type, organic matter, and soil moisture. When IVM drug is injected into cattle, the intact drug and its bioproducts: 3DI and 24OHI, are eliminated in feces following a favorable skewed normal distribution profile. IVM, 3DI, and 24OH were found to degrade rapidly when cattle pats when exposed to the field. Since we conducted our study in the Summer, no IVM or its bioproducts leached into the soil beneath. The obtained data suggest that ivermectin's massive drug administration has little to worry about, primarily when the dung from treated cattle is spread into the field in thin layers in the Summer before farm application.

The goal of the first project was to evaluate strategies for determining the in vitro intrinsic clearance (CLint) of dextrorphan (DR) as metabolized by the UGT2B7 enzyme to obtain dextrorphan glucuronide (DR-G). A direct injection liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) method was used to monitor products using the pseudo-first-order (PFO) model. Standard enzymatic incubations were also quantified using LC-MS. These data were fit utilizing both PFO and Michaelis-Menten (MM) models to determine estimates of kinetic parameters. The CLint was determined to be 0.28 (± 0.08) µL/min/mg protein for a baculovirus insect cell-expressed UGT2B7 enzyme. This is the first confirmation that dextrorphan is specifically metabolized by UGT2B7 and the first report of these kinetic parameters. Simulated chromatographic data were used to determine the precision and accuracy in the estimation of peak volumes in comprehensive two-dimensional liquid chromatography (2D-LC). Volumes were determined both by summing the areas in the second dimension chromatograms via the moments method and by fitting the second dimension areas to a Gaussian peak. When only two second dimension signals are substantially above baseline, the accuracy and precision are poor because the solution to the Gaussian fitting algorithm is indeterminate. The fit of a Gaussian peak to the areas of the second dimension peaks is better at predicting the peak volume when there are at least three second dimension injections above the limit of detection. Based on simulations where the sampling interval and sampling phase were varied, we conclude for well-resolved peaks that the optimum precision in peak volumes in 2D separations will be obtained when the sampling ratio is approximately two. This provides an RSD of approximately 2 % for the signal-to-noise (S/N) used in this work. The precision of peak volume estimation for experimental data was also assessed, and RSD values were in the 4-5 % range. We conclude that the poorer precision found in the 2D-LC experimental data as compared to 1D-LC is due to a combination of factors, including variations in the first dimension peak shape related to undersampling and loss in S/N due to the injection of multiple smaller peaks onto the second dimension column.

Research on the electrocoagulation (EC) of hexane extractable materials (HEM) has been conducted at the University of New Orleans using a proprietary bench-scale EC reactor. The original reactor configuration forced the fluid to follow a vertical upward-downward path. An alternate electrode arrangement was introduced so that the path of flow became horizontal. Both configurations were evaluated by comparing the residence time distribution (RTD) data generated in each case. These data produced indication of internal recirculation and stagnant water when the fluid followed a vertical path. These anomalies were attenuated when the fluid flowed horizontally and at a velocity higher than 0.032 m s-1 . A series of EC experiments were performed using a synthetic emulsion with a HEM concentration of approximately 700 mg l-1. It was confirmed that EC of HEM follows first-order kinetics, and kinetic constants of 0.0441 s-1 and 0.0443 s-1 were obtained from applying both the dispersion and tanks-in-series (TIS) models, respectively. In both cases R2 was 0.97. Also, the TIS model indicated that each cell of the EC behaves as an independent continuous-stirred-tank reactor.

Este trabalho avaliou a tratabilidade dos lixiviados do aterro sanitário de São Carlos-SP, utilizando-se reatores biológicos. O experimento foi conduzido à temperatura ambiente, em uma unidade piloto construída no aterro sanitário de São Carlos-SP. Inicialmente foram testados e comparados dois tipos de reatores anaeróbios, cada um com volume total de 1.200 L e ambos providos de agitação mecânica, diferenciando-se pelo tipo de imobilização da biomassa, sendo o primeiro com biomassa auto-imobilizada (ASBR) e o segundo com biomassa imobilizada em espuma de poliuretano (ASBBR). Um filtro biológico anaeróbio contínuo de fluxo ascendente de aproximadamente 120 L também foi avaliado. Além do pré-tratamento anaeróbio, foi avaliado também o pós-tratamento, que consistiu em um sistema de lodos ativados em batelada seqüencial de aproximadamente 180 L. O ASBR, inoculado com lodo granular de reator UASB, apresentou-se ineficiente, com problemas de desagregação e sedimentação da biomassa. O ASBBR, inoculado com lodo proveniente do fundo de uma lagoa de lixiviados, ao final de sua adaptação, apresentou eficiências superiores a 70%, em termos de remoção de DQO, utilizando-se lixiviado sem diluição, com DQO afluente da ordem de 11.000 mg/L, relação AVT/DQO aproximadamente igual a 0,6 e tempo de reação igual a 7 dias. Verificou-se que a biodegradabilidade anaeróbia dos lixiviados está diretamente relacionada à relação AVT/DQO, e que para relações AVT/DQO Total inferiores a 0,25, a biodegradabilidade é baixa, para relações entre 0,25 e 0,40 é média, e acima de 0,40 pode ser considerada elevada. Observou-se também que concentrações de N-amoniacal, da ordem de até 4.500 mg/L, não impedem o tratamento anaeróbio, desde que a biomassa esteja devidamente adaptada. Aos perfis temporais de concentração, realizados no ASBBR, foi ajustado um modelo de primeira ordem para consumo de substrato, na forma de DQO Total, obtendo valores de K1 variando entre 3,18 x \'10 POT.-5\' e 5,82 x \'10 POT.-5\' /(d.mgSTV/L). O pós-tratamento dos efluentes do ASBBR foi avaliado em um sistema de lodos ativados em batelada seqüencial, que obteve eficiência máxima da ordem de 30% em termos de remoção de DQO, com DQO afluente da ordem de 5.000 mg/L. Quanto ao filtro biológico anaeróbio de fluxo ascendente, obteve-se eficiências superiores a 70%, ao ser alimentado com uma mistura de lixiviado recalcitrante e etanol acidificado, com DQO afluente da ordem de 20.000 mg/L. / This work evaluated the tractability of landfill leachate from São Carlos-SP, utilizing biological reactors. The experiment was conducted at environmental temperature, in a pilot scale unity constructed into the São Carlos-SP landfill area. Initially, it was compared and tested two kinds of anaerobic reactors, each one with 1.200 L of total volume and both provided of mechanical agitation, differing by the kind of biomass immobilization, having the first (ASBR), self-immobilized biomass, and the second (ASBBR), immobilized biomass in polyurethane foam cubes. An approximately 120 L volume continuous up flow anaerobic biofilter was also evaluated. Additionally to the anaerobic treatment, it was also evaluated the post-treatment of landfill leachate in a sequence batch activated sludge system of 180 L. The ASBR, inoculated with a granular UASB sludge from a poultry wastewater treatment, was inefficient and presented sludge segregation and sedimentation problems. The ASBBR, inoculated using the sludge from the bottom of a landfill leachate reservoir, at the final of acclimation, presented efficiency over 70%, in terms of COD removal, utilizing landfill leachate without water dilution, with an inlet COD at the range of 11,000 mg/L, a TVA/COD ratio of approximately 0.6 and reaction time equal to 7 days. It was realized that the landfill leachate anaerobic biodegradability has a directly relationship to the TVA/COD ratio, and for TVA/COD Total ratio lower than 0.25, the biodegradability is low, for ratios between 0.25 and 0.40 is medium, and up to 0.40 may be considered high. It was also observed that \'NH IND.4\' POT.+\' concentrations at the range of 4,500 mg N/L has no significant interference in the anaerobic treatment, since the biomass has properly acclimated. At the temporal profiles of concentration performed in the ASBBR, it was adjusted a first order model for the substrate consumption, in terms of COD Total, obtaining K1 values ranging between 3.18 x \'10 POT.-5\' and 5.82 x \'10 POT.-5\' /(d.mgSTV/L). The post-treatment of the ASBBR effluents was evaluated in a sequence batch activated sludge system, which has obtained maximum efficiencies at the range of 30% in terms of COD removal, with an inlet COD at the range of 5,000 mg/L. As regards of the continuous up flow anaerobic biofilter, it has obtained efficiencies superiors to 70% when fed by a mixing of recovery landfill leachate and acidified ethanol, with an inlet COD at the range of 20,000 mg/L.

Este trabalho avaliou a tratabilidade dos lixiviados do aterro sanitário de São Carlos-SP, utilizando-se reatores biológicos. O experimento foi conduzido à temperatura ambiente, em uma unidade piloto construída no aterro sanitário de São Carlos-SP. Inicialmente foram testados e comparados dois tipos de reatores anaeróbios, cada um com volume total de 1.200 L e ambos providos de agitação mecânica, diferenciando-se pelo tipo de imobilização da biomassa, sendo o primeiro com biomassa auto-imobilizada (ASBR) e o segundo com biomassa imobilizada em espuma de poliuretano (ASBBR). Um filtro biológico anaeróbio contínuo de fluxo ascendente de aproximadamente 120 L também foi avaliado. Além do pré-tratamento anaeróbio, foi avaliado também o pós-tratamento, que consistiu em um sistema de lodos ativados em batelada seqüencial de aproximadamente 180 L. O ASBR, inoculado com lodo granular de reator UASB, apresentou-se ineficiente, com problemas de desagregação e sedimentação da biomassa. O ASBBR, inoculado com lodo proveniente do fundo de uma lagoa de lixiviados, ao final de sua adaptação, apresentou eficiências superiores a 70%, em termos de remoção de DQO, utilizando-se lixiviado sem diluição, com DQO afluente da ordem de 11.000 mg/L, relação AVT/DQO aproximadamente igual a 0,6 e tempo de reação igual a 7 dias. Verificou-se que a biodegradabilidade anaeróbia dos lixiviados está diretamente relacionada à relação AVT/DQO, e que para relações AVT/DQO Total inferiores a 0,25, a biodegradabilidade é baixa, para relações entre 0,25 e 0,40 é média, e acima de 0,40 pode ser considerada elevada. Observou-se também que concentrações de N-amoniacal, da ordem de até 4.500 mg/L, não impedem o tratamento anaeróbio, desde que a biomassa esteja devidamente adaptada. Aos perfis temporais de concentração, realizados no ASBBR, foi ajustado um modelo de primeira ordem para consumo de substrato, na forma de DQO Total, obtendo valores de K1 variando entre 3,18 x \'10 POT.-5\' e 5,82 x \'10 POT.-5\' /(d.mgSTV/L). O pós-tratamento dos efluentes do ASBBR foi avaliado em um sistema de lodos ativados em batelada seqüencial, que obteve eficiência máxima da ordem de 30% em termos de remoção de DQO, com DQO afluente da ordem de 5.000 mg/L. Quanto ao filtro biológico anaeróbio de fluxo ascendente, obteve-se eficiências superiores a 70%, ao ser alimentado com uma mistura de lixiviado recalcitrante e etanol acidificado, com DQO afluente da ordem de 20.000 mg/L. / This work evaluated the tractability of landfill leachate from São Carlos-SP, utilizing biological reactors. The experiment was conducted at environmental temperature, in a pilot scale unity constructed into the São Carlos-SP landfill area. Initially, it was compared and tested two kinds of anaerobic reactors, each one with 1.200 L of total volume and both provided of mechanical agitation, differing by the kind of biomass immobilization, having the first (ASBR), self-immobilized biomass, and the second (ASBBR), immobilized biomass in polyurethane foam cubes. An approximately 120 L volume continuous up flow anaerobic biofilter was also evaluated. Additionally to the anaerobic treatment, it was also evaluated the post-treatment of landfill leachate in a sequence batch activated sludge system of 180 L. The ASBR, inoculated with a granular UASB sludge from a poultry wastewater treatment, was inefficient and presented sludge segregation and sedimentation problems. The ASBBR, inoculated using the sludge from the bottom of a landfill leachate reservoir, at the final of acclimation, presented efficiency over 70%, in terms of COD removal, utilizing landfill leachate without water dilution, with an inlet COD at the range of 11,000 mg/L, a TVA/COD ratio of approximately 0.6 and reaction time equal to 7 days. It was realized that the landfill leachate anaerobic biodegradability has a directly relationship to the TVA/COD ratio, and for TVA/COD Total ratio lower than 0.25, the biodegradability is low, for ratios between 0.25 and 0.40 is medium, and up to 0.40 may be considered high. It was also observed that \'NH IND.4\' POT.+\' concentrations at the range of 4,500 mg N/L has no significant interference in the anaerobic treatment, since the biomass has properly acclimated. At the temporal profiles of concentration performed in the ASBBR, it was adjusted a first order model for the substrate consumption, in terms of COD Total, obtaining K1 values ranging between 3.18 x \'10 POT.-5\' and 5.82 x \'10 POT.-5\' /(d.mgSTV/L). The post-treatment of the ASBBR effluents was evaluated in a sequence batch activated sludge system, which has obtained maximum efficiencies at the range of 30% in terms of COD removal, with an inlet COD at the range of 5,000 mg/L. As regards of the continuous up flow anaerobic biofilter, it has obtained efficiencies superiors to 70% when fed by a mixing of recovery landfill leachate and acidified ethanol, with an inlet COD at the range of 20,000 mg/L.