Comparison and combination of titrimetric and respirometric techniques to estimate nitrification kinetics parameters

Abstract

A respirometric technique (open respirometry) and a titrimetric technique (pH-stat) were compared to monitor the first nitrification step (ammonia oxidation to nitrite) by providing a titrimetric biosensor (ANITA), previously developed to measure ammonia oxidation kinetics, with an oxygen electrode. Then, a new procedure for the simultaneous estimation of kinetic constants related to both ammonia and nitrite oxidisers which couples both open respiration and titration, is presented. This procedure allows for the complete characterisation of the nitrifying biomass kinetics with simple and short (1 to 1.5 h) tests without any analytical substrate determination. All data handling was implemented on Excel data sheets in order to be able to follow data interpolation step by step instead of using software packages which automatically perform data processing.

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