Correlation of Seasonal Nitrification Failure and Ammonia-Oxidizing Community Dynamics in a Wastewater Treatment Plant Treating Water from a Saline Thermal Spa
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Ann Microbiol (2014) 64:1671–1682 DOI 10.1007/s13213-014-0811-5 ORIGINAL ARTICLE Correlation of seasonal nitrification failure and ammonia-oxidizing community dynamics in a wastewater treatment plant treating water from a saline thermal spa Luciano Beneduce & Giuseppe Spano & Francesco Lamacchia & Micol Bellucci & Francesco Consiglio & Ian M. Head Received: 21 August 2013 /Accepted: 9 January 2014 /Published online: 24 January 2014 # Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg and the University of Milan 2014 Abstract In this work we evaluated the effect of a perturba- sampling period. This study reports a clear association of tion on nitrification performance in a wastewater treatment microbial community dynamics (strongly correlated to salin- plant (WWTP) treating urban and saline thermal bath waste- ity, temperature, and dissolved oxygen) to nitrification perfor- water, which regularly occurred during summer months. We mance. Particularly, ammonia-oxidizing bacteria are severely wanted to find out if this related to changes in the ammonia affected by drastic changes in operational conditions, with oxidizing communities. The bacterial and ammonia-oxidizing direct consequences on WWTP performance. bacterial (AOB) community from three different basins of the WWTP were evaluated using PCR-DGGE and cloning and Keywords Activated sludge . DGGE (denaturing gradient gel sequencing of 16S rRNA gene fragments, over a six month electrophoresis) . Diversity . Nitrification . AOB . Wastewater survey. Both eubacterial and AOB communities underwent treatment continuous change over time, with a particularly prominent shift between the third and fourth month of monitoring for eubacteria and the fourth month and fifth month for AOB. At Introduction the same time, reduction of nitrification performance was observed in the WWTP. The AOB community in the activated Nitrification in wastewater treatment plants (WWTP) is main- sludge was dominated by clones with high 16S rRNA se- ly driven by the activity of aerobic, chemolithoautotrophic quence identity to halophilic-halotolerant organisms from the ammonia oxidizing bacteria (AOB) and nitrite-oxidizing bac- Nitrosomonas oligotrohpa and Nitrosomonas marina clusters. teria (NOB). The former are typically considered rate limiting A significant correlation (R=0.97) was detected between the for nitrification, since AOB are slow growing and more sen- structure of the AOB community and environmental parame- sitive to environmental factors such as dissolved oxygen (DO) ters, indicating that the AOB community structure changed in content, salinity, light and substrate concentration (Wagner line with the environmental changes that took place over the et al. 1995; Koops et al. 2003; Geets et al. 2006). Failure of nitrogen removal from sewage in WWTP can dramatically : : L. Beneduce (*) G. Spano F. Lamacchia affect surface water environments receiving final effluent, Dipartimento di Scienze Agrarie, Alimentari ed Ambientali, leading to eutrophication and other ecological risks (Painter Università di Foggia, via Napoli 25, 71122 Foggia, Italy 1986; Philips et al. 2002;Jensen2003). e-mail: [email protected] AOB form two evolutionary distinct groups. The first falls : L. Beneduce M. Bellucci within the Gammaproteobacteria and comprises the STAR* Agroenergy Research Group, Università di Foggia, Foggia, Nitrosococcus species, and the second forms a monophyletic Italy group within the Betaproteobacteria, with the genera F. Consiglio Nitrosomonas and Nitrosospira (Purkhold et al. 2000). More Acquedotto Pugliese S.p.A. U.C.I.S. compartimento di Foggia, recently, ammonia-oxidizing Archaea have been detected in Foggia, Italy WWTP (Park et al. 2006); however, their significance in nitrogen removal in wastewater treatment remains open to I. M. Head School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Newcastle University, debate (Wells et al. 2009;YeandZhang2011). In addition, Drummond Building, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 7RU England, UK a further group belonging to the order Planctomycetales is 1672 Ann Microbiol (2014) 64:1671–1682 associated with the anaerobic ammonia oxidation (Anammox) conducted a survey of AOB communities and nitrification process (Jetten et al. 2001). performance over a 6-month period in which the salinity of The phylogeny of AOB has been described on the basis of the wastewater increased by 30 %. comparative 16S rRNA sequence analysis (Head et al. 1993; The aim of this study was to establish the effect of this Teske et al. 1994;Purkholdetal.2000). To date, all AOB perturbation on nitrification performance and whether this isolated from soil and freshwater habitats belongs to the related to changes in the AOB communities. During the 6- Betaproteobacteria, whereas AOB belonging to month survey the nitrogen removal performance was severely Gammaproteobacteria have only been isolated from marine compromised by environmental conditions. and other saline environments (Ward and O’Mullan 2002). Culture based studies of the diversity and ecology of AOB in natural and engineered systems are severely hampered by Materials and methods the slow growth rates and autotrophic metabolism of AOB, which are easily outcompeted by heterotrophic organisms Sampling (Watson et al. 1989; Wagner et al. 1993). Analysis of 16S rRNA genes and genes encoding the alpha Sludge samples were collected from an activated sludge subunit of ammonia monooxygenase (amoA), Fluorescence wastewater treatment plant, located in Margherita di Savoia In-Situ Hybridization (FISH) and denaturing gradient gel (Apulia, Italy), treating urban and saline spa wastewater. The electrophoresis (DGGE) have been used widely to analyse WWTP consisted of a primary settler, a pre-denitrification AOB populations and communities in many environments basin with recirculation from oxidation/nitrification, an acti- and have led to many aspects of the ammonia oxidizing vated sludge oxidation/nitrification basin and a secondary bacterial community ecology being unravelled in detail. settler. The average hydraulic retention time was 12.5 h and AOB community composition and diversity in natural and the average solid retention time was 8.4 days. engineered systems have been related to variables such as Sampling was conducted at intervals of 30 days, over a ammonia content (Lydmark et al. 2007), salinity (Freitag period of six months, from March to August. A total of six et al. 2006), type of substratum (Gorra et al. 2007), DO time-weighted (12 h) average samples were taken in triplicate concentrations (Bellucci et al. 2011), reactor design (Rowan from the pre-denitrification basin (DEN), oxidation basin et al. 2003) and the presence of heavy metals (Principi et al. (OXI) and recirculating sludge from the secondary settler 2009). Moreover, characterization of the AOB community (RIC), respectively. After sampling, sludge samples were composition and diversity, distribution patterns and ecophys- frozen at −20 °C and transported to the laboratory for DNA iology has been reviewed (Koops et al. 2003) while 16S extraction. The pH, conductivity and DO concentration were rRNA and amoA based phylogeny has been extended and determined directly at the time of sampling. Total suspended improved (Purkhold et al. 2003). solids (TSS), nitrite, nitrate and ammonium content were Correlations among the structure and functional stability of assayed on unfrozen aliquots of the same samples used for AOB communities in WWTPs, physicochemical parameters microbial community analysis. and efficiency of bioreactors have been postulated and inves- tigated by many authors (Wittebolle et al. 2005, 2008; DNA extraction and PCR amplification Siripong and Rittman 2007;Belluccietal.2013). However, many aspects still remain to be ascertained. For instance, the Ten milliliters of mixed liquor samples were centrifuged at role of functional redundancy, which may allow communities 10,000 g for 2 min and the supernatant was discarded. Nucleic to maintain physiological capabilities while their composition acids extraction from 0.25 g of sludge samples was carried out changes in response to environmental conditions, is not yet with a Power Soil DNA extraction kit (MoBio, Carlsbad, CA well understood. – USA) according to the manufacturer’s protocol. Each DNA In this paper we monitored bacterial and AOB community extraction was performed in duplicate, the amount of DNA composition and diversity in a wastewater plant treating a was estimated by visualization on a 1 % agarose gel stained mixture of urban wastewater and wastewater from a thermal with ethidium bromide, and the molecular weight was esti- bath (spa). mated by comparison with Gelpilot 100 bp plus ladder This WWTP is regularly subject to an increase in salinity, (Qiagen, Milan, Italy) used as a DNA molecular weight mark- temperature and reduced dissolved oxygen content every year er. Extracted DNA concentration was adjusted to 10 ng μl−1 during the summer months. The changes in salinity in the with sterile deionised water and stored at −20 °C until wastewater resulting from seasonal changes in the contribu- analysis. tion from the spa bath waters provide an excellent opportunity To study total Bacteria and AOB communities, a separate to assess the effects of short term salinity changes on AOB primer set and PCR protocols were used. PCR amplification communities and nitrification performance. We, therefore, of eubacterial 16S rRNA gene fragments was performed using Ann Microbiol (2014) 64:1671–1682 1673 Primer 357f-GC (5′-CGC CCG CCG CGC GCG GCG GGC acrylamide