Lessons from rhizosphere and gastrointestinal ecosystems for inventive design of sustainable wastes recycling bioreactors

• Specialized wastes treatment bioreactors (SWTBR) are not sustainable.
• Microbial communities as models to design SWRBR.
• SWRBR design is based on the theory of solving inventive problem (TRIZ).
• SWRBR avoids the unbalance of the geochemical cycles and energy overconsumption.

The functional stabilities of ecosystems are still overlooked by pollution treatment specialists concerning the bioprocesses design and operation. Indeed, specialized wastes treatment bioreactors (SWTBR) used to remove pollution are not sustainable due to their greenhouse gases emission. TRIZ theory (Russian acronym for Theory of Solving Inventive Problem) was applied to propose an inventive sustainable bioreactor design thanks to its capacity to increase the level of abstraction for creative problems resolution. The SWRBR was designed after applying the three fundamental concepts of TRIZ and identification of the principal contradictions in SWTBR. The proposed coupling between the essential ecosystems characteristics especially, the trophic reactions and the matter recycling was used to solve the identified contradictions in SWTBR and to design SWRBR. The dense microbial communities especially associated with animals through gastrointestinal tract and plants through rhizosphere constitute excellent models to design sustainable wastes recycling bioreactors (SWRBR). The designed SWRBR avoids the unbalance of the geochemical cycles, and can help process engineers systematically find creative solutions for sustainable waste treatment.