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Degradation of typical antibiotics during human feces aerobic composting under different temperatures

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Abstract

Four typical antibiotics were added to human feces for aerobic composting using batch reactors with sawdust as the bulk matrix. Under three composting temperatures (room temperature, 35 ± 2 °C and 55 ± 2 °C), decreases in the extractable concentrations of antibiotics in the compost were monitored for 20 days. As a result, the removals of extractable tetracycline and chlortetracycline were found to be more temperature-dependent than the removals of sulfadiazine and ciprofloxacin. However, more than 90 % of all of the extractable antibiotics were removed at 55 ± 2 °C. Three specific experiments were further conducted to identify the possible actions for antibiotic removal, including self-degradation in aqueous solution, composting with a moist sterile sawdust matrix without adding feces and composting with human feces and moist sterile sawdust. As a result, it was found that the removal of tetracycline and chlortetracycline was mainly due to chemical degradation in water, whereas the removal of sulfadiazine was mainly attributed to adsorption onto sawdust particles. The microbial activity of compost varied with temperature to a certain extent, but the differences were insignificant among different antibiotics. Although microbial action is important for organic matter decomposition, its contribution to antibiotic degradation was small for the investigated antibiotics, except for ciprofloxacin, which was degraded by up to 20 % due to microbial action.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 50838005), and the Program for Innovative Research Teamin Shanxi Province (Grant No. 2013KCT-13).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. International Science & Technology Cooperation Center for Urban Alternative Water Resources Development; Key Lab of Northwest Water Resource, Environment and Ecology, MOE; Engineering Technology Research Center for Wastewater Treatment and Reuse, Xi’an, Shaanxi Province, China

    Honglei Shi, Xiaochang C. Wang, Qian Li & Shanqing Jiang

  2. Key Lab of Environmental Engineering, Xi’an, Shaanxi Province, China

    Honglei Shi, Xiaochang C. Wang, Qian Li & Shanqing Jiang

  3. Xi’an University of Architecture and Technology, No. 13, Yanta Road, Xi’an, 710055, China

    Honglei Shi, Xiaochang C. Wang, Qian Li & Shanqing Jiang

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  1. Honglei Shi
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  2. Xiaochang C. Wang
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  3. Qian Li
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  4. Shanqing Jiang
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Correspondence to Xiaochang C. Wang.

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Shi, H., Wang, X.C., Li, Q. et al. Degradation of typical antibiotics during human feces aerobic composting under different temperatures. Environ Sci Pollut Res 23, 15076–15087 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-016-6664-7

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