Microbial Concrete—a Sustainable Solution for Concrete Construction

In the ever-increasing demand of construction and construction materials worldwide, concrete is the most extensively used material for construction purposes almost next to the water. Therefore, there is a dire need of clean, green and durable concrete. Recently, an environmentally friendly strategy has been employed to manufacture bio-concrete by the usage of microorganisms in the traditional concrete to enhance its durability and compressive strength. In this review, we discuss the role of microbes in influencing the various properties of concrete such as compressive strength, flexural strength and tensile strength by reducing the concrete porosity and diminishing water absorption. The mechanism of microbial-induced calcium carbonate precipitation (MICP) in the traditional concrete by the action of microbes which resulted in the formation of bio-concrete as an improved building material has also been discussed. Additionally, an in-depth comparative analysis of the performance of bio-concrete with the traditional concrete synthesized from various industrial wastes such as silica fume, rice husk ash and metakaolin in terms of different properties such as compressive strength, flexural strength and percentage water absorption has been presented. This review highlights the impact of usage of microbes in the conventional concrete to produce novel and eco-friendly bio-concrete in construction technology.