Key Laboratory of Molecular Microbiology and Technology for Ministry of Education, Nankai University, Tianjin 300071, China.
Environ Sci Technol. 2011 Sep 1;45(17):7408-15. doi: 10.1021/es2010545. Epub 2011 Aug 4.
The activated sludge process is an essential process for treating domestic and industrial wastewaters in most wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). This process consists of a mixture of general and special microorganisms in a form of a complex enrichment population. Thus, the exploration of activated sludge microbial communities is crucial to improve the performance of activated sludge process. In this study, we investigated the phylogenetic diversity and metabolic potential of activated sludge microbial communities in full-scale WWTPs. Four 16S rRNA gene clone libraries were constructed from activated sludge samples. In all samples, Proteobacteria was the most abundant phylogenetic group, followed by Bacteroidetes and Firmicutes. The dominance of Proteobacteria was further demonstrated by denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE) and terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism (T-RFLP). Some specific genera, e.g., Nitrosomonas, Thauera, and Dechloromonas, which significantly correlate with the functions and performance of wastewater treatment, were abundant in all samples. A large number of unclassified sequences were found in the library, suggesting that a wide variety of novel species may inhabit complex activated sludge communities. The structures of the bacterial community did not differ significantly among samples. All samples utilized the vast majority of 31 carbon sources of an EcoPlate (Biolog), suggesting that activated sludge microbial communities possess high metabolic potential and equivalent functions required for wastewater treatment.
活性污泥法是大多数污水处理厂（WWTP）处理生活和工业废水的重要工艺。该工艺由一般和特殊微生物的混合物组成，以复杂的富集种群的形式存在。因此，探索活性污泥微生物群落对于提高活性污泥工艺的性能至关重要。在本研究中，我们调查了全规模 WWTP 中活性污泥微生物群落的系统发育多样性和代谢潜力。从活性污泥样品中构建了四个 16S rRNA 基因克隆文库。在所有样品中，变形菌门是最丰富的系统发育群，其次是拟杆菌门和厚壁菌门。变性梯度凝胶电泳（DGGE）和末端限制性片段长度多态性（T-RFLP）进一步证明了变形菌门的优势。一些特定的属，如亚硝化单胞菌、陶厄氏菌和脱氯菌，与废水处理的功能和性能显著相关，在所有样品中都很丰富。文库中发现了大量未分类的序列，这表明复杂的活性污泥群落中可能栖息着各种各样的新物种。细菌群落的结构在样品之间没有显著差异。所有样品都利用了 EcoPlate（Biolog）的 31 种碳源中的绝大多数，这表明活性污泥微生物群落具有很高的代谢潜力和处理废水所需的等效功能。
