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Microbial community analysis of three municipal wastewater treatment plants in winter and spring using culture-dependent and culture-independent methods

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Abstract

Low temperatures can result in start-up and operational problems in wastewater treatment plants. The microbial community structures of three full-scale biological processes for municipal wastewater treatment, namely, anoxic–oxic activated sludge (A/O) process, oxidation ditch, and sequencing batch reactor, in winter and spring were investigated. The performances of the three biological processes were all stable during winter and spring. Comparing all three plants, the NH4 +-N removal efficiency using the A/O process was found to be the highest during both winter and spring. According to the similarity coefficient of the polymerase chain reaction and denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis analysis determined via the culture-independent method, the microbial community structure is the most stable using the A/O process at different temperatures. The dominant members primarily belonged to Proteobacteria, Nitrospira, and Bacteroidetes. In addition, Proteobacteria was the dominant member in the activated sludge utilizing peptone, glucose, and fatty acid. Compared with other biological processes, the A/O process was superior at low temperatures based on its pollution removal performance and stable microbial community sturcture.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the National Creative Research Group from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 51121062), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 51108120, 51178139 and 51108145), the 4th China Postdoctoral Science Special Foundation (No. 201104430), the 46th China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (No. 20090460901), the Key Projects of National Water Pollution Control and Management of China (Nos. 2008ZX07313-001 and 2012ZX07301-001) and the Science and Technology Development Program of Jilin Province (No. 201101108). We thank the EssayStar Company (http://essaystar.com/) for their English language editing.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Lab of Urban Water Resource and Environment, School of Municipal and Environmental Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin, 150090, People’s Republic of China

    Di Cui, Ang Li, Si Zhang, Changlong Pang, Jixian Yang, Jingbo Guo, Fang Ma & Nanqi Ren

  2. School of Life Science and Technology, Harbin Normal University, Harbin, 150025, People’s Republic of China

    Jihua Wang

  3. School of Environment and Urban Construction, Wuhan Textile University, Wuhan, 430073, People’s Republic of China

    Fang Ma

  4. School of Civil Engineering, Northeast Dianli University, Jilin City, 132012, Jilin, People’s Republic of China

    Jingbo Guo

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  1. Di Cui
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  2. Ang Li
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  3. Si Zhang
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  4. Changlong Pang
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  7. Fang Ma
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  8. Jihua Wang
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  9. Nanqi Ren
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Correspondence to Fang Ma or Jihua Wang.

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Cui, D., Li, A., Zhang, S. et al. Microbial community analysis of three municipal wastewater treatment plants in winter and spring using culture-dependent and culture-independent methods. World J Microbiol Biotechnol 28, 2341–2353 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11274-012-1041-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11274-012-1041-2

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