In the present investigation

a microbial consortium consisting of four bacterial strains was selected for the treatment of pharmaceutical industry wastewater. The consortium was immobilized on a natural support matrix-

Luffa

and used for the treatment of real-time pharmaceutical wastewater in batch and continuous processes. The batch process was carried out to optimize the culture conditions and monitor the enzymatic activity. An array of enzymes such as alcohol dehydrogenase

aldehyde dehydrogenase

monooxygenase

catechol 2

3-dioxygenase and hydroquinol 1

2-dioxygenase were produced by the consortium. The kinetics of the degradation in the batch process was analyzed and it was noted to be a first-order reaction. For the continuous study

an aerobic fixed-film bioreactor (AFFBR) was utilized for a period of 61 days with variable hydraulic retention time (HRT) and organic loading rate (OLR). The immobilized microbes treated the wastewater by reducing the COD

phenolic contaminants and suspended solids. The OLR ranged between (0.56 ± 0.05) kg COD·m

-3

d

-1

to 3.35 kg COD·m

-3

·d

-1

and the system achieved

an average reduction of 96.8% of COD

92.6% of phenolic compounds and 95.2% of suspended solids. Kinetics of the continuous process was interpreted by three different models

where the modified Stover Kincannon model and the Grau second-order model proved to be best fit for the degradation reaction with the constant for saturation value

KL being 95.12 g·L

-1

·d

-1

the constant for maximum utilization of the substrate

U

max

being 90.01 g·L

-1

d

-1

and substrate removal constant

K

Y

was 1.074 d

-1

for both the models. GC-MS analysis confirmed that most of the organic contaminants were degraded into innocuous metabolites.