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Fungal degradation of selected medium to highly polar pesticides by Trametes versicolor: kinetics, biodegradation pathways, and ecotoxicity of treated waters

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Abstract

The massive use of pesticides represents one of the main causes of environmental deterioration, as they have adverse effects on non-target organisms. Thus, the development of technologies capable of reducing their release into the environment is urgently needed. This study reports for the first time the white-rot fungus Trametes versicolor as an alternative towards the degradation of medium to highly polar pesticides such as the organophosphate malathion, and the neonicotinoids acetamiprid and imidacloprid. Specifically, T. versicolor could completely remove 1 mg/L of malathion in an Erlenmeyer flask within 48 h, while experiments of acetamiprid and imidacloprid (4 mg/L), conducted in air-pulse fluidized bioreactors, resulted in degradation percentages of 20% and 64.7%, respectively, after 7 days of operation. Enzymatic exploration studies revealed that the cytochrome P450 system, instead of the extracellular enzyme laccase, is involved in the degradation of acetamiprid and imidacloprid. The degradation pathways were proposed based on the main transformation products (TPs) formed in the solutions: seven in the case of malathion, and two and one in the case of imidacloprid and acetamiprid, respectively. Although the TPs identified were predicted to be less toxic than the investigated pesticides, the toxicity of the individual solutions slightly increased throughout the degradation process, according to the Microtox assay. However, the solution toxicity was always below the threshold established in the local regulation. Although additional research is needed to implement this treatment at a pilot plant scale, this work highlights the potential of T. versicolor to bio-remediate pesticide-contaminated waters.

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Funding

This work has been supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness State Research Agency (CTM2016-75587-C2-1-R and CTM2016-75587-C2-2-R) and co-financed by the European Union through the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the Horizon 2020 research and innovation WATERPROTECT project (727450). This work was partly supported by the Generalitat de Catalunya (Consolidate Research Group 2017-SGR-01404) and the Ministry of Science and Innovation (Project CEX2018-000794-S). The Department of Chemical, Biological, and Environmental Engineering of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona is a member of the Xarxa de Referència en Biotecnologia de la Generalitat de Catalunya. K. Hu acknowledges the financial support from the Chinese Scholarship Council.

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Author notes

  1. Kaidi Hu and Maria Vittoria Barbieri contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departament d’Enginyeria Química, Biològica i Ambiental, Escola d’Enginyeria, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 08193 Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain

    Kaidi Hu & Montserrat Sarrà

  2. Water, Environmental, and Food Chemistry Unit (ENFOCHEM), Department of Environmental Chemistry, Institute of Environmental Assessment and Water Research (IDAEA), Spanish Council for Scientific Research (CSIC), Jordi Girona 18-26, 08034, Barcelona, Spain

    Maria Vittoria Barbieri, Ester López-García, Cristina Postigo & Miren López de Alda

  3. Institut de Química Avançada de Catalunya (IQAC), CSIC, Jordi Girona 18-26, 08034, Barcelona, Spain

    Gloria Caminal

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  1. Kaidi Hu
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Contributions

Kaidi Hu: writing, original draft; investigation; formal analysis; visualization.

Maria Vittoria Barbieri: writing, original draft; investigation; formal analysis; visualization.

Ester López-García: writing—review and editing; investigation; visualization.

Cristina Postigo: supervision; writing—review and editing.

Miren López de Alda: writing—review and editing; funding acquisition; resources.

Gloria Caminal: supervision; writing—review and editing.

Montserrat Sarrà: writing—review and editing; funding acquisition; resources.

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Correspondence to Miren López de Alda.

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Hu, K., Barbieri, M.V., López-García, E. et al. Fungal degradation of selected medium to highly polar pesticides by Trametes versicolor: kinetics, biodegradation pathways, and ecotoxicity of treated waters. Anal Bioanal Chem 414, 439–449 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00216-021-03267-x

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