Bacterial biofilm-based bioleaching: Sustainable mitigation and potential management of e-waste pollution

Significant advances in the electrical and electronic industries have increased the use of electrical and electronic equipment and its environmental emissions. The e-waste landfill disposal has deleterious consequences on human health and environmental sustainability, either directly or indirectly. E-waste containing ferrous and non-ferrous materials can harm the surrounding aquatic and terrestrial environments. Therefore, recycling e-waste and recovering metals from it before landfill disposal is an important part of environmental management. Although various chemical and physical processes are being used predominantly to recover metals from e-waste, the bioleaching process has gained popularity in recent years due to its eco-friendliness and cost-effectiveness. Direct contact between microbes and e-waste is crucial for continuous metal dissolution in the bio-leaching process. Biofilm formation is key for the continuous dissolution of metals from e-waste in contact bioleaching. Critical reviews on microbial activities and their interaction mechanisms on e-waste during metal bioleaching are scarce. Therefore, this review aims to explore the advantages and disadvantages of biofilm formation in contact bioleaching and the practical challenges in regulating them. In this review, sources of e-waste, available metallurgical methods, bioleaching process, and types of bioleaching microbes are summarized. In addition, the significance of biofilm formation in contact bioleaching and the role and correlation between EPS production, cyanide production, and quorum sensing in the biofilm are discussed for continuous metal dissolution. The review reveals that regulation of quorum sensing by exogenous and endogenous processes facilitates biofilm formation, leading to continuous metal dissolution in contact bioleaching.