Thesis supervisor: Sándor Beszédes
co-supervisor: Gábor Keszthelyi-Szabó
Location of studies (in Hungarian): Szegedi Tudományegyetem Mérnöki Kar Abbreviation of location of studies: SZTE
Description of the research topic:
Several types of wastewater and sludge have high organic matter content, but, in many cases, the complex structure of macromolecules and toxic components inhibit the biodegradation, or decrease the biodegradation rate. Short time microwave treatments are suitable to increase the aerobic biodegradation, furthermore capable to increase the rate of anaerobic digestion and improve the biogas yield, as well. In order to evaluate the applicability of microwave irradiation, as a wastewater/sludge treatment/pre-treatment method, need to investigate the effects of microwave-specific process parameters on organic matter solubility, or disintegration degree of sludge particles, furthermore another key issue is the analysis of complex energy efficiency of the continuously flow process. Further detailed analyses are needed to investigate the efficiency of combined microwave-chemical pre-treatment methods in real wastewater/sludge matrix. Determination of dielectric parameters of processed materials is needed to estimate the thermal efficiency of microwave irradiation, and to discover the possible connection between the physico-chemical changes and dielectric behaviour. Results of these research help to optimize the microwave processes and enable to develop algorithms and models to estimate the efficiency during the pre-treatment step (real time and/or in line).