SCV0821 - GREEN BIOMASSES AND BIOREMEDIATION

The ‘Green Biomasses and Bioremediation’ course is a required course for students who want to understand how a biotechnological, plant-based approach can ensure that economic and social development occurs within a context that respects the most important ecological principles.
In particular, the course is based on theoretical lessons on how plants can be used to restore areas subject to severe degradation or pollution, and on the production of fuels and other derivatives from processing plant material.
Frontal lectures are also held in laboratory facilities equipped with specialized instrumentation and pre-treated samples. In particular, these sessions aim to characterize biomass and biochar using elemental, structural, and microscopic analyses, and to evaluate biochar’s capacity to adsorb pollutants in aqueous solutions. Advanced imaging techniques are used to examine biochar structure, metal localization, and plant root responses to environmental contaminants, including fluorescent micro- and nanoplastics.
Finally, school trips will visit industrial settings for biomass treatment (e.g., pyrolysis and a combined heat and power plant), genotype selection for genetic improvement, and a constructed wetland for secondary water treatment.
This course therefore aims to provide an overview of the biological and molecular mechanisms that enable plant organisms to be used for the purposes described above, as well as various types of applications, production techniques, and specifications for primary and secondary products.
At the end of the course, the student will be able to:
- Design and illustrate recovery and restoration processes of degraded environments using plant organisms; - Know and discuss the processes for the production of fuels from plant material as well as secondary derivative products;
- Discuss in an integrated way some fundamental elements of plant biology, environmental problems, and traditional techniques, to understand the biological-molecular basis relating to the two previous points;
- Critically understand a scientific text that deals with cellular, anatomical, and physiological properties of plant species to be used for biotechnological applications.