water Review New Advances in Aerobic Granular Sludge Technology Using Continuous Flow Reactors: Engineering and Microbiological Aspects Aurora Rosa-Masegosa 1,2, Barbara Muñoz-Palazon 1,2,* , Alejandro Gonzalez-Martinez 1,2, Massimiliano Fenice 3 , Susanna Gorrasi 3 and Jesus Gonzalez-Lopez 1,2 1 Faculty of Pharmacy, Campus de Cartuja, University of Granada, s/n, 18071 Granada, Spain;
[email protected] (A.R.-M.);
[email protected] (A.G.-M.);
[email protected] (J.G.-L.) 2 Department of Microbiology, Institute of Water Research, University of Granada, C/Ramón y Cajal, 4, 18071 Granada, Spain 3 Dipartimento di Ecologia e Biologia, Università degli Studi della Tuscia, Largo Università snc, 01100 Viterbo, Italy;
[email protected] (M.F.);
[email protected] (S.G.) * Correspondence:
[email protected] Abstract: Aerobic granular sludge (AGS) comprises an aggregation of microbial cells in a tridimen- sional matrix, which is able to remove carbon, nitrogen and phosphorous as well as other pollutants in a single bioreactor under the same operational conditions. During the past decades, the feasibility of implementing AGS in wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) for treating sewage using fundamen- tally sequential batch reactors (SBRs) has been studied. However, granular sludge technology using Citation: Rosa-Masegosa, A.; SBRs has several disadvantages. For instance, it can present certain drawbacks for the treatment Muñoz-Palazon, B.; of high flow rates; furthermore, the quantity of retained biomass is limited by volume exchange. Gonzalez-Martinez, A.; Fenice, M.; Therefore, the development of continuous flow reactors (CFRs) has come to be regarded as a more Gorrasi, S.; Gonzalez-Lopez, J.