Complete ammonia oxidation: an important control on nitrification in engineered ecosystems?

Nitrification has long been considered to be mediated by two distinct microbial guilds, the ammonia-oxidizing bacteria and archaea, and the nitrite-oxidizing bacteria. The process has been widely applied as an environmental biotechnology for ammonium removal during water and wastewater treatment. Recently, bacteria capable of complete nitrification of ammonia to nitrate (a process termed complete ammonia oxidation, or comammox) have been discovered. These novel nitrifiers have been identified in a range of engineered, natural freshwater and terrestrial ecosystems, challenging previously held knowledge on the key microorganisms and biochemical pathways controlling nitrification. This paper discusses the distribution of comammox bacteria with a focus on engineered ecosystems, as well as emerging insights from recent genomic and experimental studies on their ecophysiology.