U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Research and Development, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Research and Development, Newport, Oregon, USA.
Appl Environ Microbiol. 2020 Apr 1;86(8). doi: 10.1128/AEM.02967-19.
Cultivated fecal indicator bacteria such as and enterococci are typically used to assess the sanitary quality of recreational waters. However, these indicators suffer from several limitations, such as the length of time needed to obtain results and the fact that they are commensal inhabitants of the gastrointestinal tract of many animals and have fate and transport characteristics dissimilar to pathogenic viruses. Numerous emerging technologies that offer same-day water quality results or pollution source information or that more closely mimic persistence patterns of disease-causing pathogens that may improve water quality management are now available, but data detailing geospatial trends in wastewater across the United States are sparse. We report geospatial trends of cultivated bacteriophage (somatic, F, and total coliphages and GB-124 phage), as well as genetic markers targeting polyomavirus, enterococci, , , and human-associated spp. (HF183/BacR287 and HumM2) in 49 primary influent sewage samples collected from facilities across the contiguous United States. Samples were selected from rural and urban facilities spanning broad latitude, longitude, elevation, and air temperature gradients by using a geographic information system stratified random site selection procedure. Most indicators in sewage demonstrated a remarkable similarity in concentration regardless of location. However, some exhibited predictable shifts in concentration based on either facility elevation or local air temperature. Geospatial patterns identified in this study, or the absence of such patterns, may have several impacts on the direction of future water quality management research, as well as the selection of alternative metrics to estimate sewage pollution on a national scale. This study provides multiple insights to consider for the application of bacterial and viral indicators in sewage to surface water quality monitoring across the contiguous United States, ranging from method selection considerations to future research directions. Systematic testing of a large collection of sewage samples confirmed that crAssphage genetic markers occur at a higher average concentration than key human-associated spp. on a national scale. Geospatial testing also suggested that some methods may be more suitable than others for widespread implementation. Nationwide characterization of indicator geospatial trends in untreated sewage represents an important step toward the validation of these newer methods for future water quality monitoring applications. In addition, the large paired-measurement data set reported here affords the opportunity to conduct a range of secondary analyses, such as the generation of new or updated quantitative microbial risk assessment models used to estimate public health risk.
培养的粪便指示菌，如 和肠球菌，通常用于评估娱乐用水的卫生质量。然而，这些指标存在一些局限性，例如获得结果所需的时间以及它们是许多动物胃肠道共生居民的事实，并且其命运和运输特征与致病病毒不同。现在有许多提供当日水质结果或污染源信息的新兴技术，或者更能模拟致病病原体持续模式的技术，这些技术可能会改善水质管理，但详细说明美国废水中的地理空间趋势的数据却很少。我们报告了培养噬菌体（躯体、F 和总大肠噬菌体和 GB-124 噬菌体）以及靶向多瘤病毒、肠球菌、、、和人类相关的 spp.（HF183/BacR287 和 HumM2）的遗传标记的地理空间趋势，这些噬菌体和遗传标记存在于美国各地设施的 49 个原污水样本中。这些样本是通过使用地理信息系统分层随机站点选择程序，从具有广泛纬度、经度、海拔和空气温度梯度的农村和城市设施中选择的。污水中的大多数指标无论位置如何，浓度都非常相似。然而，有些指标的浓度会根据设施海拔或当地空气温度的变化而发生可预测的变化。本研究中确定的地理空间模式或缺乏这种模式可能会对未来水质管理研究的方向以及在全国范围内估计污水污染的替代指标的选择产生影响。这项研究为在整个美国应用粪便中的细菌和病毒指标进行地表水质量监测提供了多个需要考虑的见解，从方法选择考虑因素到未来的研究方向。对大量污水样本的系统测试证实，在全国范围内，crAssphage 遗传标记的平均浓度高于关键的人类相关 spp.。地理空间测试还表明，对于广泛实施而言，某些方法可能比其他方法更合适。对未经处理的污水中指示物的地理空间趋势进行全国性描述是验证这些较新技术用于未来水质监测应用的重要步骤。此外，这里报告的大型配对测量数据集提供了进行各种二次分析的机会，例如生成用于估计公共卫生风险的新的或更新的定量微生物风险评估模型。
