Effect of the chemical composition of filter media on the microbial community in wastewater biofilms at different temperatures

Naz, Iffat; Hodgson, Douglas; Smith, Ann; Marchesi, Julian; Ahmed, Safia; Avignone-Rossa, Claudio; Saroj, Devendra P.

Abstract

© 2016 The Royal Society of Chemistry. This study investigates the microbial community composition in the biofilms grown on two different support media in fixed biofilm reactors for aerobic wastewater treatment, using next generation sequencing (NGS) technology. The chemical composition of the new type of support medium (TDR) was found to be quite different from the conventionally used support medium (stone). The analysis of 16S rRNA gene fragments recovered from the laboratory scale biofilm system show that biofilm support media and temperature conditions influence bacterial community structure and composition. Greater bacterial diversity was observed under each condition, primarily due to the large number of sequences available and sustenance of rare species. There were 6 phyla found, with the highest relative abundance shown by the phylum Proteobacteria (52.71%) followed by Bacteroidetes (33.33%), Actinobacteria (4.65%), Firmicutes, Verrucomicrobia (3.1%) and Chloroflex (>1%). The dataset showed 17 genera of bacterial populations to be commonly shared under all conditions, suggesting the presence of a core microbial community in the biofilms for wastewater treatment. However, some genera in the biofilms on TDR were observed in high proportions, which may be attributed to its chemical composition, explaining the improved level of wastewater treatment. The findings show that the structure of microbial communities in biofilm systems for wastewater treatment is affected by the properties of support matrix.

Citation

Naz, I., Hodgson, D., Smith, A., Marchesi, J., Ahmed, S., Avignone-Rossa, C., & Saroj, D. P. (2016). Effect of the chemical composition of filter media on the microbial community in wastewater biofilms at different temperatures. RSC Advances, 6(106), 104345-104353. https://doi.org/10.1039/c6ra21040f

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Oct 24, 2016
• Online Publication Date: Oct 26, 2016
• Publication Date: Jan 1, 2016
• Deposit Date: Oct 2, 2019
• Publicly Available Date: Oct 4, 2019
• Journal: RSC Advances
• Electronic ISSN: 2046-2069
• Publisher: Royal Society of Chemistry
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 6
• Issue: 106
• Pages: 104345-104353
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1039/c6ra21040f
• Keywords: General Chemistry; General Chemical Engineering
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/3453539
• Additional Information: : This document is Similarity Check deposited; : Supplementary Information; : Julian Marchesi (ResearcherID); : Claudio Avignone-Rossa (ORCID); : Devendra P. Saroj (ORCID); : Devendra P. Saroj (ResearcherID); : The Royal Society of Chemistry has an exclusive publication licence for this journal; OPEN ACCESS: This article is freely available. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence (CC BY 3.0); : Single-blind; : Received 21 August 2016; Accepted 24 October 2016; Accepted Manuscript published 26 October 2016; Version of Record published 1 November 2016