Formation of soluble microbial products by activated sludge under anoxic conditions.

In this work, both experimental and modeling approaches are used to explore the formation of soluble microbial products (SMP) by activated sludge under anoxic conditions. With substrate consumption, the SMP concentration increases gradually. Utilization associated products (UAP) are the main fraction of SMP when substrate is present; whereas biomass associated products (BAP) are the major content of SMP as substrate is completely consumed. The fraction of the accumulated SMP accounts for 3-4% of initial organic substrate. Three dimensional excitation emission matrix analysis results indicate that the SMP concentration increases in the denitrification process. The accumulation of nitrite up to 22.6 mg/l under anoxic conditions has no significant effect on the SMP formation. With a consideration of SMP formation under anoxic conditions, an ASM3-based denitrification model is developed. The results show that the developed model is able to capture the relationship between the SMP formation and the substrate consumption by activated sludge in the denitrification process.