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Continuous fungal treatment of non-sterile veterinary hospital effluent: pharmaceuticals removal and microbial community assessment

  • Environmental biotechnology
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Abstract

Source point treatment of effluents with a high load of pharmaceutical active compounds (PhACs), such as hospital wastewater, is a matter of discussion among the scientific community. Fungal treatments have been reported to be successful in degrading this type of pollutants and, therefore, the white-rot fungus Trametes versicolor was applied for the removal of PhACs from veterinary hospital wastewater. Sixty-six percent removal was achieved in a non-sterile batch bioreactor inoculated with T. versicolor pellets. On the other hand, the study of microbial communities by means of DGGE and phylogenetic analyses led us to identify some microbial interactions and helped us moving to a continuous process. PhAC removal efficiency achieved in the fungal treatment operated in non-sterile continuous mode was 44 % after adjusting the C/N ratio with respect to the previously calculated one for sterile treatments. Fungal and bacterial communities in the continuous bioreactors were monitored as well.

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Acknowledgments

Authors want to acknowledge the UAB veterinary hospital staff for their kind permission and help for the samplings. This work has been funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness and FEDER (projects CTM2013-48545-C2 and AIB2010PT-00169) and supported by the Generalitat de Catalunya (Consolidated Research Groups 2014-SGR-476 and 2014-SGR-291). The Department of Chemical Engineering of the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB) is a member of the Xarxa de Referència en Biotecnologia de la Generalitat de Catalunya. M. Badia-Fabregat and D. Lucas acknowledge the predoctoral grants from UAB and from the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports (AP-2010-4926), respectively. The authors also thank the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) Strategic Project PEst-OE/EQB/LA0023/2013, Project FCOMP-01-0124-FEDER-027462 co-funded by Operational Competitiveness Programme, FEDER, and Project “BioEnv—Biotechnology and Bioengineering for a sustainable world,” REF. NORTE-07-0124-FEDER-000048, co-funded by Programa Operacional Regional do Norte (ON.2 – O Novo Norte), QREN, FEDER.

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    Authors and Affiliations

    1. Departament d’Enginyeria Química, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), 08193, Bellaterra, Spain

      Marina Badia-Fabregat & Teresa Vicent

    2. Catalan Institute for Water Research (ICRA), H2O Building, Scientific and Technological Park of the University of Girona, 101-E-17003, Girona, Spain

      Daniel Lucas, Sara Rodríguez-Mozaz & Damià Barceló

    3. CEB-Centre of Biological Engineering, University of Minho, Campus de Gualtar, 4710-057, Braga, Portugal

      Maria Alcina Pereira & Madalena Alves

    4. Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke), Jokiniemenkuja 1, FI-01301, Vantaa, Finland

      Taina Pennanen & Hannu Fritze

    5. Water and Soil Quality Research Group, Department of Environmental Chemistry (IDAEA-CSIC), Jordi Girona 18-26, 08034, Barcelona, Spain

      DamiĂ  BarcelĂł

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

      Glòria Caminal

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    1. Marina Badia-Fabregat
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    Correspondence to Glòria Caminal.

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    All authors of the article declare that they have no conflict of interest. This article does not contain any studies with human participants or animals performed by any of the authors.

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    Marina Badia-Fabregat and Daniel Lucas contributed equally to this work.

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    Badia-Fabregat, M., Lucas, D., Pereira, M.A. et al. Continuous fungal treatment of non-sterile veterinary hospital effluent: pharmaceuticals removal and microbial community assessment. Appl Microbiol Biotechnol 100, 2401–2415 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-015-7105-0

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