TERNARY INTERACTIONS IN A HUMIC ACID-CD-BACTERIA SYSTEM

Abstract

Humic acid adsorption onto the bacterial surface of Bacillus subtilis was measured with and without Cd, as a function of pH and humic-bacteria-Cd ratios. These experiments tested for the existence of ternary interactions in a bacteria-humic-metal system. We determine both the effects of humic acid on the bacterial adsorption of Cd, as well as the effects of the aqueous metal cation on the bacterial adsorption of humic acid. The presence of Cd does not affect the extent of humic acid adsorption onto the bacterial surface, indicating that there is no competition for sorption sites between humic acid and Cd under the experimental conditions, and that changes in the charging properties of the bacterial surface, as a result of the Cd adsorption, are not significant enough to affect humic acid adsorption.The presence of humic acid does diminish Cd adsorption onto the bacterial surface, suggesting the presence of an aqueous Cd-humate complex under mid to high pH conditions. However, we also observe that the solubility of humic acid is unaffected by the presence of aqueous Cd. This apparently inconsistent behavior of an aqueous Cd-humate complex affecting Cd adsorption but not affecting humic acid solubility is not observed with simpler ionizable organic molecules. We propose that the solubility of humic acid is controlled by the solubility of a less soluble fraction of the acid. Cd forms an aqueous complex with the more soluble fraction of humic acid and there is no interdependence between the aqueous activities of the more and less soluble fractions. That is, the solubility of one humic acid fraction is unaffected by the presence of an aqueous Cd-humate complex involving another humic acid fraction. These experimental results constrain the relative importance of surface ternary and aqueous metal-humate complexes on the bacterial adsorption of both humic acid and metal cations.