Physico-chemical study for zinc removal and recovery onto native/chemically modified Aspergillus flavus NA9 from industrial effluent

•Maximum zinc uptake was found to be 287.8 ± 11.1 mg g−1 in batch bioreactor.•High Elution efficiency of Zn (83.3%) was obtained to recover natural resources.•The chemical modification of Aspergillus flavus NA9 proved –COOH as major contributor.•Mechanistic study was also proved by FTIR, SEM and EDX analysis.•Data showed good fit on Freundlich, florry, and pseudo second order models.

Zinc biosorption characteristic of locally isolated Aspergillus flavus NA9 were examined as a function of pH, temperature, pulp density, contact time and initial metal ion concentration. The maximum zinc uptake was found to be 287.8 ± 11.1 mg g−1 with initial metal concentration 600 mg L−1 at initial pH 5.0 and temperature 30 °C. The equilibrium data gave good fits to Freundlich and Florry models with correlation coefficient value of 0.98. The contribution of the functional groups and lipids to zinc biosorption as identified by chemical pretreatment was in the order: carboxylic acids > hydroxyl > amines > lipids. The mechanism of biosorption was also studied using Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectrometry, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energy dispersive X-ray analysis (EDX). The biosorbent was regenerated using 0.01 M HCl with 83.3% elution efficiency and was reused for five sorption–desorption cycles with 23.5% loss in biosorption capacity. The order of co-cations showing increased inhibitions of zinc uptake by A. flavus NA9 was Pb > Cu > Mn > Ni. The biosorption assays conducted with actual paint industry effluents revealed efficiency of 88.7% for Zn (II) removal by candidate biomass.