Impact of composting conditions on the nicotine degradation rate using nicotinophilic bacteria from tobacco waste

Abstract

In the past several decades, due to the increased population, the planet has faced immense problems with waste management. The need for recycling and upcycling is increasing. It has become imperative to extract maximum value from discarded products. There are nearly one billion smokers on the planet. Tobacco butts are toxic, and they pollute the environment. In this paper, the research objective was the bio-augmentation of waste in the context of composting tobacco and vegetable waste mixtures, and the determination of nicotine degradation rate depending on the composting conditions. Low-grade Virginia tobacco leaves that were discarded from further processing were used as base material. The experiment was conducted in triplicate. To each sample, bacteria from the species Brevibacillus were added, and then, samples were composted under different conditions (controlled, semi-controlled and non-controlled). Two more samples were formed as the control group, one without bacteria and one with only tobacco waste. The research was conducted over the period of one month with monitoring of the process parameters. The tobacco waste had a baseline nicotine level of 17,363 mg/kg. In all samples containing nicotine-degrading bacteria, the level of nicotine dropped below 10 mg/kg. There was a direct positive relationship between the rate of nicotine degradation, temperature and moisture content in the samples, as well as environmental temperature and relative humidity. The content of macro-and micronutrients makes the compost appropriate for organic fertilization in agricultural production.

Energy and emission properties of burley tobacco stalk briquettes and its combinations with other biomass as promising replacement for coal

“…Samples were then eluted with an isocratic mobile phase containing 40 % (v/v) methanol and a 0.2 % (v/v) phosphoric acid buffer (pH 7.25) at a flow-rate of 0.5 mL/min. Nicotine was identified with a Waters high-performance liquid chromatograph (HPLC) (Waters Breeze, Binary Pump systems, Milford, MA, USA) at UV wavelengths between 210 and 400 nm and quantified at 254 nm as described elsewhere ( 30 , 31 ).…”

“…At the top of the furnace flue we placed a Cambridge filter pad (92 mm in diameter; Bogwaldt, Germany) to collect smoke gases ( 32 ). The filter was then removed using laboratory tweezers, and nicotine particles extracted and quantified using the HPLC method described above ( 30 , 31 ).…”

Tobacco as bioenergy and medical plant for biofuels and bioproduction

“…For example, composting tobacco waste and vegetable waste mixtures, along with biofortification using Brevibacillus ( Brevibacillus brevis ), demonstrated significant effectiveness in degrading harmful substances in tobacco. The resulting compost exhibited suitable element content for organic fertilization in agricultural production [ 11 ]. Zittel et al composted tobacco waste with industrial effluent and observed substantial reductions in nicotine and heavy metal elements.…”

Insights into Pharmacological Activities of Nicotine and 6-Hydroxy-L-nicotine, a Bacterial Nicotine Derivative: A Systematic Review

“…Although physical and chemical methods to degrade NIC from tobacco are available, these are expensive and still involve the use of harmful solvents [177]. Bioremediation and bioconversion of toxic NIC-containing wastes using NDB are environmentally friendly strategies for either decontamination [178][179][180][181][182][183][184][185] or, even more appealing, converting the waste into green chemicals.…”