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Environmental Controls on the Activity of Aquifer Microbial Communities in the 300 Area of the Hanford Site

  • Environmental Microbiology
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Abstract

Aquifer microbes in the 300 Area of the Hanford Site in southeastern Washington State, USA, are located in an oligotrophic environment and are periodically exposed to U(VI) concentrations that can range up to 10 μM in small sediment fractures. Assays of 3H-leucine incorporation indicated that both sediment-associated and planktonic microbes were metabolically active, and that organic C was growth-limiting in the sediments. Although bacteria suspended in native groundwater retained high activity when exposed to 100 μM U(VI), they were inhibited by U(VI) <1 μM in synthetic groundwater that lacked added bicarbonate. Chemical speciation modeling suggested that positively charged species and particularly (UO2)3(OH)5 + rose in concentration as more U(VI) was added to synthetic groundwater, but that carbonate complexes dominated U(VI) speciation in natural groundwater. U toxicity was relieved when increasing amounts of bicarbonate were added to synthetic groundwater containing 4.5 μM U(VI). Pertechnetate, an oxyanion that is another contaminant of concern at the Hanford Site, was not toxic to groundwater microbes at concentrations up to 125 μM.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Tom Resch and Dean Moore for their assistance with chemical analyses and groundwater sampling. This research was supported by the US Department of Energy (DOE), Office of Biological and Environmental Research, as part of Subsurface Biogeochemistry Research Program's Scientific Focus Area and Integrated Field-Scale Research Challenge at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL). PNNL is operated for DOE by Battelle under contract DE-AC06-76RLO 1830.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Microbiology Group, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, P.O. Box 999, MSIN J4-18, Richland, WA, 99352, USA

    Allan Konopka & Andrew E. Plymale

  2. Applied Research Center, Florida International University, 10555 West Flagler Street EC 2100, Miami, FL, 33174, USA

    Denny A. Carvajal

  3. School of Biology, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA, USA

    Xueju Lin

  4. Geochemistry Group, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, P.O. Box 999, MSIN K8-96, Richland, WA, 99352, USA

    James P. McKinley

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  1. Allan Konopka
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Correspondence to Allan Konopka.

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Konopka, A., Plymale, A.E., Carvajal, D.A. et al. Environmental Controls on the Activity of Aquifer Microbial Communities in the 300 Area of the Hanford Site. Microb Ecol 66, 889–896 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00248-013-0283-3

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