Ni and Cu recovery by bioleaching from the printed circuit boards of mobile phones in non-conventional medium.

There is a substantial volume of mobile phone waste every year. Due to the disadvantages of traditional methods, it is necessary to look for biological processes that are more eco-friendly and economical to recover metals from e-waste. Fungi provide large amounts of organic acids and dissolve metals but using sucrose in the medium is not economical. In this paper, the main objective is to find a suitable alternative carbon substrate instead of sucrose for fungi bioleaching of Ni and Cu in printed circuit boards (PCBs) of mobile phones using Penicillium simplicissimum. Four kinds of carbon sources (including sucrose, cheese whey, sugar, and sugar cane molasses) were selected. Also, pH and number of spores in inoculum were optimized by response surface methodology (RSM) for all carbon sources. The results showed the simultaneous maximum recovery of Cu and Ni is not possible. For Cu recovery, sugar is the best economical and simplistic medium instead of sucrose. Maximum recovery of Cu (90%) gained at the pH of 7, 3.3 × 107 spores, and in sugar. The amount of Ni recovery (89%) was highest in molasses, at the pH of 2, and 106 spores. The results proved non-conventional carbon sources improve bioleaching efficiency and the possibility of industrialization.