Microbial diversity and dynamics in multi‐ and single‐compartment anaerobic bioreactors processing sulfate‐rich waste streams
- 22 August 2006
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Wiley in Environmental Microbiology
- Vol. 9 (1), 93-106
- https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1462-2920.2006.01119.x
Abstract
Summary We investigated bacterial and archaeal community structures and population dynamics in two anaerobic bioreactors processing a carbohydrate- and sulfate- rich synthetic wastewater. A five-compartment anaerobic migrating blanket reactor (AMBR) was designed to promote biomass and substrate staging, which partially separates the processes of methano- genesis and sulfidogenesis in the middle and outer compartment(s) respectively. The second reactor was a conventional, single-compartment upflow anaero- bic sludge blanket (UASB) reactor. Both reactors, which were seeded with the same inoculum, per- formed well when the influent chemical oxygen demand (COD)/SO4 2- mass ratio was 24.4. The AMBR performed worse than the UASB reactor when the influent COD/SO4 2- mass ratio was decreased to 5.0 by raising the sulfate load. Terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism analyses of bacterial 16S rRNA genes showed that the increase in sulfate load had a greater impact on bacterial diversity and community structure for the five AMBR compart- ments than for the UASB reactor. Moreover, bacterial community profiles across AMBR compartments became more similar through time, indicating a con- verging, rather than a staged community. While similar populations were abundant in both reactors at the beginning of the experiment, fermenting bacteria (clostridia, streptococci), and sulfate-reducing bacte- ria became more abundant in the AMBR, after shifting to a higher sulfate load, while a novel Thermotogales- like population eventually became predominant in the UASB reactor. A similar shift in the community struc- ture of the hydrogenotrophic methanogens in the AMBR occurred: representatives of the Methanobac- teriaceae out-competed the Methanospirillaceae after increasing the sulfate load in the AMBR, while the archaeal community structure was maintained in the UASB.Keywords
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