Micropollutants or contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) are released into the environment from a wide variety of sources. Due to the adverse effect on human health, micropollutant-containing wastewater needs to be treated before its discharge. A number of conventional physicochemical methods have been extensively studied for micropollutant degradation. However, owing to their one or more disadvantages, biological treatment using suitable microorganisms is of recent interest. Numerous bacteria and fungi are capable of degrading these micropollutants even at high concentrations. However, in order for the biological treatment to be commercially viable and industrially scalable, bioprocess development with efficient bioreactor systems is highly essential. This paper reviews state-of-the-art techniques for the removal of micropollutants by conventional biological systems such as activated sludge process, biofilm-based reactor, and trickling bed bioreactor. However, compared with conventional systems, advanced biological systems, namely two-phase partitioning bioreactor, membrane-based reactor, and cell-immobilized bioreactor systems, have not been examined and, hence, need detailed exploration. Such advanced treatment systems are capable of tolerating high pollutant load and are also able to treat highly water insoluble pollutants. Furthermore, hybrid systems comprising of a combination of different physicochemical and biological processes are discussed in this paper, which are not only capable of improving the treatment efficiency but also eliminate any accumulation of the toxic by-product produced during the treatment. Among the different hybrid systems, a combination of different biological systems is found to be highly efficient in treating micropollutant-containing wastewater. Finally, scope for future research prospects in the field are derived and addressed in details.

中文翻译：

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从废水中去除有机微污染物的生物处理工艺：综述。

引起关注的微污染物或污染物（CEC）从多种来源释放到环境中。由于对人体健康的不利影响，含微污染物的废水需要在排放前进行处理。对于微污染物的降解，已经对许多常规的物理化学方法进行了广泛的研究。然而，由于它们的一个或多个缺点，使用合适的微生物进行生物处理近来受到关注。许多细菌和真菌即使在高浓度下也能够降解这些微量污染物。然而，为了使生物处理在商业上可行并在工业上可扩展，具有高效生物反应器系统的生物过程开发是非常必要的。本文概述了通过常规生物系统（如活性污泥法，基于生物膜的反应器和滴流床生物反应器）去除微量污染物的最新技术。但是，与常规系统相比，尚未研究先进的生物系统，即两相分配生物反应器，基于膜的反应器和细胞固定的生物反应器系统，因此需要进行详细的探索。这种先进的处理系统能够承受高污染物负荷，并且还能够处理高度水不溶性污染物。此外，本文还讨论了由不同物理化学和生物过程结合而成的混合系统，它们不仅能够提高治疗效率，而且还能消除治疗过程中产生的有毒副产物的任何积累。在不同的混合系统中，发现不同生物系统的组合在处理含微污染物的废水方面非常有效。最后，得出并详细论述了该领域未来研究前景的范围。