Effect of chemical concentrations on strength and crystal size of biocemented sand

Biocementation due to the microbially induced calcium carbonate precipitation (MICP) process is a potential technique that can be used for soil improvement. However, the effect of biocementation may be affected by many factors, including nutrient concentration, bacterial strains, injection strategy, temperature, pH, and soil type. This study investigates mainly the effect of chemical concentration on the formation of calcium carbonate (e.g., quantity, size, and crystalline structure) and unconfined compressive strength (UCS) using different treatment time and chemical concentration in the biotreatment. Two chemical concentrations (0.5 and 1.0 M) and three different treatment times (2, 4, and 8 cycles) were studied. The effect of chemical concentrations on the treatment was also examined by making the total amount of chemicals injected to be the same, but using different times of treatment and chemical concentrations (8 cycles for 0.50 M and 4 cycles for 1.00 M). The UCS and CCC were measured and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) analysis was carried out. The SEM images revealed that the sizes of calcium carbonate crystals increased with an increase in chemical concentrations. The UCS values resulting from the treatments using low concentration were slightly greater than those from the treatments using high concentration, given the CCC to be more or less the same. This trend can be attributed to the size of the precipitated crystals, in which the cementation efficiency increases as the crystal size decreases, for a given CCC. Furthermore, in the high concentration treatment, two mineral types of calcium carbonate were precipitated, namely, calcite and amorphous calcium carbonate (ACC). As the crystal shape and morphology of ACC differ from those of calcite, the bonding provided by ACC can be weaker than that provided by calcite. As a result, the conditions of calcium carbonate were affected by test key factors and eventually, contributed to the UCS values.