Self-Healing Concrete (Bio Concrete)

This report discusses the concept of self-healing concrete, also known as bio concrete, in the construction industry. It explores the advantages and disadvantages of bio concrete, its current applications, and compares it with traditional concrete. The use of bio concrete helps enhance the strength and durability of concrete by utilizing bacteria for self-healing properties.

Self-Healing Concrete (Bio Concrete)
Executive Summary
This report has been focused on the concept of bio
concrete in construction industry. The use of bio
concrete has been helping in enhancing the strength and
durability of concrete used in the construction industry.
This concrete has been helping in self-healing property

by the use of bacteria in concrete. This report discusses
about advantages and disadvantages of bio concrete in
construction industry. The current application of bio
concrete in the construction industry has been
discussed. There have been a proper comparison of bio
concrete with traditional concrete have done.

Table of Contents
Executive Summary..........................................................................1
Introduction.........................................................................................3
Self-Healing Concrete (Bio Concrete).......................................3
Different types of microorganisms (bacteria’s)..................3
Advantages and Disadvantages of Bio Concrete...............3
Current Application in the Modern Construction Industry
..................................................................................................................3
Compare Bio Concrete with Traditional Concrete...............3
Conclusion............................................................................................3

Introduction
Concrete has been the most important building
material for construction industry. Concrete is made up
of water, coarse, fine and cement. Cement has been the
most essential part of concrete material. It helps in
binding aggregates and fill voids between coarse and
fine particles. However, concrete have high tendency to
bear cracks in the infrastructure. Small cracks on
surface of concrete makes all structure look vulnerable
as water seeps to degrading the concrete and corrode
the steel reinforcement and decreasing the life span
(Khaliq and Ehsan 2016). However, when it is subjected
for creating tension, it starts to crack more. Therefore,
this have been a big issue with the concrete used in the
construction industry. Various structures are made in
water or nearby water sources. For example, Motorway
bridges have been vulnerable as salts have been used for
de-ice roads penetrating into the cracks and accelerate
the corrosion of steel reinforcement. In various cases of
civil engineering, corrosion have been the main issue for
engineers to maintain properly. Repairs can be done
properly however, it is a time consuming process. In
several cases, it become difficult to reach to critical
points for repairing cracks. Along with this, concrete
suffers from relatively low tensile strength and ductility.
Therefore, to reduce this issue in construction
industry, Bio Concrete is used in the construction
industry. This report deals with various aspects of bio
concrete and how it works as self-healing concrete.

Self-Healing Concrete (Bio Concrete)
Self-healing concrete refers to product that is made
up of biological limestone for healing cracks for
appearing on surface of concrete surfaces (Seifan,
Samani and Berenjian 2016). There have been special
type of bacteria genus Bacillus with calcium based
nutrient own as calcium lactate and nitrogen phosphorus
have been mixed with the concrete. These self-healing
agents help in lying domant within the concrete for upto
200 years. Therefore, when an infrastructure is damaged
with water and heat, the bacteria present in the concrete
starts working and heal up the cracks automatically. The
bacteria starts to feed oxygen is consumed and soluble
calcium lactate has been converted to insoluble
limestone. The limestone solidifies on the cracked
surfaces (Seifan et al. 2016). Oxygen has been an
essential part in the corrosion of steel and bacterial
activity has able to consume it all and increases the
durability of steel concrete construction.
Different types of microorganisms (bacteria’s)
There are various types of microorganism which are
responsible for preparation of bio concrete. These types
of bacteria are mentioned in below table:
Microorganism Nutrient Embedment in
concrete
Bacterial
metabolic
conversion of
organic acid
Bacillus
pseudofirmus
Calcium
lactate,
calcium
glutamate,
yeast extract,
Direct

and peptone
Bacillus
pseudofirmus B.
cohnii
Calcium
lactate,
calcium
acetate, yeast
extract, and
peptone
Direct
B. cohnii Calcium
lactate and
yeast extract
Immobilized
Bacillus
alkalinitrilicus
Calcium
lactate and
yeast extract
Immobilized
Ureolysis
Bacillus
sphaericus
Urea, calcium
nitrate, and
yeast extract
Immobilized
S. pasteurii
Pseudomonas
aeruginosa
Urea and
calcium
chloride
Direct
Bacillus
sphaericus S.
pasteurii
Urea and
calcium
chloride
Immobilized
S. pasteurii Urea and
calcium
chloride
Direct
Denitrification
Sporosarcina soli
Bacillus
massiliensis
Arthrobacter
crystallopoietes
Lysinibacillus
fusiformis
Urea and
calcium
chloride
Immobilized

Bacillus
amyloliquedacien
s
Urea, calcium
acetate yeast
extract, and
glucose
Direct
Diaphorobacter
nitroreducens
Bacillus
sphaericus
Urea, calcium
formate,
calcium
nitrate, and
yeast extract
Advantages and Disadvantages of Bio Concrete
There have been various advantages and
disadvantages of Bio Concrete in the construction
industry.
Advantages of Bio Concrete:
 Self-repairing of cracks without any help of external
factor
 There have been increase in compressive strength
and flexural strength during comparison to normal
concrete.
 It provide resistance towards freeze-thaw attacks
(Luo et al. 2018).
 It helps in reducing in permeability of concrete.
 It reduces corrosion of steel that are firmed due to
cracks formation and helps in improving durability
of steel reinforced concrete.
 Bacillus bacteria have been harmless for human life
and can be used effectively.

 Major structures that have lifespan extension ca be
improved. This helps in reducing carbon footprint
and overall cost of structures.
 The self-healing methods help in reducing costly
disruption by minimizing number and extent of
repairs required.
 The self-healing bacterial concrete helps in reducing
maintenance and repairing costs of steel reinforced
concrete structures (Gupta et al. 2017).
 Self-healing bacteria has been used in places where
humans are not able to reach for the maintenance of
structures. Therefore, it helps in reducing risk of
human life in construction industry.
Following are the disadvantages of bio concrete:
 The cost of bacteria concrete has been double than
conventional concrete.
 The growth of bacteria is not good at any type of
atmosphere and media.
 The clay pellets have been holding self-healing agent
compromising of 20% of the volume of the concrete.
This have been creating shear zone in the concrete
(Muhammad et al. 2016). There have been many
structures that have not been a problem and
specialised applications in which higher compressive
strength has been needed including in high rise
buildings.
 Designing of mix concrete having bacteria and not
available in any ISO or other code.
 Preparation of self-healing concrete requires
bacteria and calcium lactate from milk has been
costlier.

 The process has been working efficiently and have
been adding a liquid for spraying into existing
buildings. However, the main problem has been cost
of bacteria and bio concrete (Silva et al. 2015). The
cost of the bio concrete has been much higher than
normal concrete. Therefore, various construction
organization are not willing to use this bio concrete
in their construction.
Current Application in the Modern Construction
Industry
Self-healing concrete has been the future for the
modern construction industry. This will help in changing
the scenario of construction industry. At present, same
of the construction companies have been using bio
concrete for construction building and structures. This
help in reducing potholes and cracks in buildings
(Tziviloglou et al. 2016). This concrete have been used in
roadways and parking lot. This hep in minimizing the
damage of vehicles over the roads due to uneven
surfaces. Property owners have been showing interest in
building structures using bio concrete. Self-healing
technique of bio concrete has been attracting many
companies and contractors for using this concrete in
their construction. Self-healing has been providing
enhanced strength and durability to buildings and
structures (Mignon et al. 2016). This help in great return
of the investment done in the projects. There have been
very limited practical applications of bio concrete in
construction industry. This technology has been already
under testing process in various laboratories. The best
uses of bio concrete will be dine in near future.

Compare Bio Concrete with Traditional Concrete
There have been many changes done in the
construction industry. One of the major changes in the
industry has been the use of Bio Concrete. The
traditional concrete has many disadvantages in the
construction industry (Tziviloglou et al. 2017). In recent
report, it has been found that the use of traditional
concrete has been facing corrosion from water, heat and
air at long time. Cracks and openings are observed at
various places of buildings and walls. There have been
some cracks that are not reachable by human to repair
that. Therefore, the strength of traditional concrete has
been low in recent years. On other hand, bio concrete
has been providing strength to building structures (Joshi
et al. 2017). In recent years, the construction industry
has focused on safety and durability of structures. The
traditional structure design has been demolished as the
structure has been old. Therefore, new design of
structures can be constructed by using bio concrete.
There have been many techniques adopted for increasing
the strength and durability of concrete (Sharma 2016).
Microbial treatment has been the latest technique for
improving strength and durability of the cement in the
structures. This has been creating a revolutionary
change in the construction industry. There have been
soluble of calcium lactate and bacteria in the concrete.
This helps in increasing the strength of the concrete.
Bacteria s help in self-healing fiction of the concrete.
This has been helping in repairing the cracks and ores
over the structure due to corrosion (Verma et al. 2015).
Therefore, the strength of the structure remains the
same as before.

Conclusion
It can be concluded that the use of the bi concrete
has been helping in self-healing property of concrete in
the buildings. The use of the concrete has been helping
in self-repairing of cracks and pores occurring due to
corrosion. There have been various difference between
traditional concrete and bio concrete. The use of bio
concrete has been helping in providing strength and
durability to buildings and structures in the construction
industry.

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