Sustainable bioremediation of radionuclides from wastewater: Recent trends and bottlenecks

Abstract Accelerated growth of nuclear power plants has prompted global concern in addressing environmental issues associated with radionuclides usage. Several research studies target biosorption as one of the potential strategies for removal of radionuclides, which relies predominantly on engineered microbes, chemically modified sorbents, and raw biosorbents or biomaterials. In certain cases, algal strains have shown postbiosorption biomineralization of these harmful molecules, which makes them a unique sorbent for remediation of radionuclides. This chapter reviews the recent advancements in remediation of radionuclides utilizing biological molecules with special attention on algal strains (cyanobacteria, microalgae, and macroalgae), their mechanism, and efficiency. The study will also evaluate the feasibility in utilizing such robust organisms and overall process sustainability.