The world's population is expected to reach the eight billion mark very soon. As a result, there is a need for increased industrial and agricultural production to ensure human wellbeing. This in turn generates huge amounts of waste. Current waste treatment solutions are effective, but usually require huge capital investment, are labour intensive and potentially lead to hazardous by-products. This book presents the latest non-biological approaches to address issues related to the abundance of waste, offering insights into best practices in various regions around the globe. It highlights techniques such as chemical extraction, pyrolysis and ultrasonics, and a number of chapters include individual case studies to further enhance readers' understanding. This comprehensive reference resource is intended for graduate students, researchers and scientists, and is also a valuable addition to all agriculture and biotechnology libraries.

This reference book covers the ecological impact and biotechnological applications of diatoms. Diatoms contribute to forty percent of primary productivity in aquatic ecosystems. They have a unique biomonitoring ability and sensitivity towards different pollutants in wastewater, thereby a tool for ecotoxicological monitoring. The book discusses the need for newer diatoms-based indices for wastewater quality analysis. It describes the nutraceutical value of the myriad compounds like omega 3 fatty acids-DHA, polysaccharides, phenols in diatoms. It also elaborates on the challenges in sustainable diatom biorefinery. This book is meant for microbiologists, biotechnologists, and marine biologists.

Key Points: 1. Discusses the role of microbial enzymes in functional food and nutraceutical production 2. Covers a range of enzymes like proteases, pullulanases, lipases 3. Explores various microbial sourcess and processing techniques 4. Reviews application of enzymes in synthesis of chiral drug intermediates 5. Examines molecular techniques on improving microbial enzymes properties and ability