diclofenac was achieved by forest soil microbial consortia within 7 days (Facey et al.
2018). Ecosystem functioning may get disturbed by changing in the functional
groups of microorganisms (Rodarte-Morales et al. 2012). Biodegradation is regarded
as the key process for abolishing the prevalent xenobiotics including
pharmaceuticals (Topp et al. 2013). Degradation of contaminants is likely to be
only if the toxicity of the molecules does not obstruct the activities of microbes.
Fig. 13.6 Biodegradation pathway of pharmaceutical compound ibuprofen by Micrococcus
yunnanensis (adapted from Sharma et al. 2019)
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K. Sharma and G. Kaushik