Peroxidases-based enticing biotechnological platforms for biodegradation and biotransformation of emerging contaminants

Rampant industrial boom, urbanization, and exponential population growth resulted in widespread environ-mental pollution, with water being one of the leading affected resources. All kinds of pollutants, including phenols, industrial dyes, antibiotics, pharmaceutically active residues, and persistent/volatile organic com-pounds, have a paramount effect, either directly or indirectly, on human health and aquatic entities. Strategies for affordable and efficient decontamination of these emerging pollutants have become the prime focus of ac-ademic researchers, industry, and government to constitute a sustainable human society. Classical treatment techniques for environmental contaminants are associated with several limitations, such as inefficiency, complex pretreatments, overall high process cost, high sludge generation, and highly toxic side-products formation. Enzymatic remediation is considered a green and ecologically friendlier method that holds considerable potential to mitigate any kinds of contaminating agents. Exploiting the potential of various peroxidases for pollution abatement is an emerging research area and has considerable advantages, such as efficiency and ease of handling, over other methods. This work is designed to provide recent progress in deploying peroxidases as green and versatile biocatalytic tools for the degradation and transformation of a spectrum of potentially hazardous environmental pollutants to broaden their scope for biotechnological and environmental purposes. More studies are required to explicate the degradation mechanisms, assess the toxicology levels of bio-transformed metabo-lites, and standardize the treatment strategies for economic viability.