What is Attached Growth

The development of effective and simple methods for treating wastewater is a challenging task for environmental engineers. In this chapter, a novel modified anaerobic hybridized baffled (MAHB) bioreactor, which is a combination of regular suspended-growth and fixed biofilm systems together with the modification of baffled-reactor configurations, was proven to be a modest bioreactor for wastewater treatment rather than the commercial anaerobic baffled reactor (ABR). The significant advantages of this bioreactor were its ability to nearly realize the multi-stages anaerobic theory, allowing different bacterial groups to develop under more favourable conditions, reduced sludge bed expansion, no special gas or sludge separation required, and high stability to organic and toxic shock loads. The compartmentalization of this bioreactor results in a buffering zone between the primary acidification zone and active methanogenesis zone, and provided the strong ability to resist shock loads which broaden the usage of multi-phase anaerobic technology for industrial wastewater treatment.