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Microbial Community Growth and Utilization of Carbon Constituents During Thermophilic Composting at Different Oxygen Levels

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Abstract

Composting is characterized by dramatic changes in microbial community structure, to a high extent driven by changes in temperature and in the composition of the organic substrate. This study focuses on the interrelationships between decomposition of major classes in the organic material and dynamics in microbial populations during thermophilic composting of source-separated organic household waste.

Experiments were performed in a 200-L laboratory reactor at 16, 2.5, and 1% O2 in the compost atmosphere. Major classes of carbon constituents were analyzed by chemical methods, and the microbial biomass and community structure determined by fatty acid analyses with phospholipid fatty acids (PLFA) and total ester-linked fatty acids (EL) methods. At all three O2 levels, the process was characterized by a rapid increase in microbial activity and biomass in the early thermophilic phase, although this period was delayed at the lower O2 concentrations. Starch and fat were the main substrates utilized at all three O2 levels during this period. The depletion of the starch fraction coincided with the beginning of a microbial biomass decrease, suggesting thatstarch is an important carbon substrate for the growth of thermophilic microorganisms during composting. Growth yields in the microbial community based on consumption of major carbon constituent classes in the high-activity period fell between 22 and 28%. Multivariate statistical analysis of changes in fatty acid composition revealed small, but statistically significant differences in the microbial community succession. At 16% O2, 10Me fatty acids from Actinomycetes and cyclopropyl fatty acids (from Gram-negative bacteria) became more important with time, whereas 18:1ω7t was characteristic at 2.5 and 1% O2, indicating a more stressed bacterial community at the lower O2 concentrations.

Although adequate composting was achieved at O2 levels as low as 2.5 and 1%, it is not recommended to compost at such low levels in large-scale systems, because the heterogeneous gas transport through the material in these systems might lead to anaerobic conditions and inefficient composting.

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Acknowledgments

Financial support for this study was obtained from the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency and FORMAS (The Swedish Research Council for Environment, Agricultural Sciences and Spatial Planning).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Microbiology, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala, Sweden

    Kristin Steger & Ingvar Sundh

  2. Department of Soil Sciences, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Uppsala, Sweden

    Ylva Eklind

  3. Centre for Human Studies of Foodstuffs, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden

    Johan Olsson

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  1. Kristin Steger
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  2. Ylva Eklind
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  4. Ingvar Sundh
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Correspondence to Kristin Steger.

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Steger, K., Eklind, Y., Olsson, J. et al. Microbial Community Growth and Utilization of Carbon Constituents During Thermophilic Composting at Different Oxygen Levels. Microb Ecol 50, 163–171 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00248-004-0139-y

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