Bioremediation is cleaning up polluted areas through biological means. Bacteria, fungi, plants and other organisms break down contaminants or store them in their tissue for eventual disposal. It has become a more popular choice for the removal of traditional methods due to its less costly nature.

The use of Bioremediation is most noticeable in the cases of oil spills. When a spill occurs, microbes that are native to the area are the first to react. During the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, scientists noticed that the native bacteria were doing more of the work than their augmented ones, mainly because the microbes they introduced were not able to survive in the ocean water.

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Other Sources

Griggs, Mary Beth. “How Microbes Clean up our Environmental Messes.” Popular Mechanics. http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/environment/a7176/how-microbes-will-clean-up-our-messes/. Accessed July 13, 2016.