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Deterministic assembly process dominates bacterial antibiotic resistome in wastewater effluents receiving river

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Abstract

Antibiotic resistance has become a concerning global health challenge, such as the dissemination of bacteria and genes between humans and the environments. Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) effluents, as significant reservoirs for antimicrobial resistant bacteria and antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs), pose critical risks to public health. However, whether wastewater effluent prominently contributes to the abundance of ARGs and their community assembly processes in receiving river has yet been unclear. Here we investigated the effects of the effluent discharge on the ARGs and their associate microbial community in the receiving river (Qinhuai River, Nanjing) of upstream and 2000 m downstream of one WWTPs discharge point. Results revealed that the total antibiotic concentrations of all sediment samples ranged from 37.86 to 76.11 µg/kg dw, while antibiotic concentrations and ARG abundances in the river near the wastewater discharge site were significantly higher than that of the downstream receiving river. The metagenomic assembly obtained 245 ARGs associated with 19 antibiotic types in the receiving river. Network analyses confirmed that Proteobacteria, Firmicutes, Acidobacteria, and Bacteroides were the key phylum and positively correlated with the antibiotic resistome. Additionally, the bacterial pathogens of the receiving river were identified as the most frequent strains of clinically relevant antibacterial resistance, such as Streptococcus pneumoniae, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Acinetobacter baumannii. Using null modeling analysis to determine the quantification of ecological processes, the results showed that heterogeneous environmental selection (81.81%) was a dominate role of the ecological mechanisms determining the ARG community reconstruction in the receiving river. Our results may contribute to control the environmental dissemination of antimicrobial resistance risks in aquatic environments.

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Data availability

The datasets used and analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Funding

This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (5210100094) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (B210201006).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Oceanography, Hohai University, Nanjing, China

    Linqiong Wang & Zhe Zhao

  2. College of Environment, Hohai University, Nanjing, China

    Mengjie Zhu, Yi Li & Tong Hu

Authors
  1. Linqiong Wang
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  2. Mengjie Zhu
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  3. Yi Li
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  4. Zhe Zhao
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  5. Tong Hu
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Contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Linqiong Wang, conceptualization, methodology, and writing-original draft preparation; Yi Li, writing-reviewing and editing and supervision. Lihua Niu: methodology, software, and supervision; Mengjie Zhu, data curation, visualization; Tong Hu, resources.

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Correspondence to Linqiong Wang.

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Wang, L., Zhu, M., Li, Y. et al. Deterministic assembly process dominates bacterial antibiotic resistome in wastewater effluents receiving river. Environ Sci Pollut Res 29, 90207–90218 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-22096-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-022-22096-8

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