Microbial communities and functional genes of nitrogen cycling in an electrolysis augmented constructed wetland treating wastewater treatment plant effluent

Pengfei Zhang; Yuke Peng; Junling Lu; Jie Li; Huiping Chen; Lin Xiao

doi:10.1016/j.chemosphere.2018.07.067

Microbial communities and functional genes of nitrogen cycling in an electrolysis augmented constructed wetland treating wastewater treatment plant effluent

Chemosphere. 2018 Nov:211:25-33. doi: 10.1016/j.chemosphere.2018.07.067. Epub 2018 Jul 17.

Authors

Pengfei Zhang¹, Yuke Peng², Junling Lu³, Jie Li⁴, Huiping Chen⁵, Lin Xiao⁶

Affiliations

¹ School of the Environment, Nanjing University, State Key Laboratory for Pollution Control and Resource Reuse (SKL-PCRR), Nanjing University Xianlin Campus, Xianlin Avenue 163, Nanjing, 210023, China. Electronic address: pengfzhang@163.com.
² School of the Environment, Nanjing University, State Key Laboratory for Pollution Control and Resource Reuse (SKL-PCRR), Nanjing University Xianlin Campus, Xianlin Avenue 163, Nanjing, 210023, China. Electronic address: pan.107@gmail.com.
³ School of the Environment, Nanjing University, State Key Laboratory for Pollution Control and Resource Reuse (SKL-PCRR), Nanjing University Xianlin Campus, Xianlin Avenue 163, Nanjing, 210023, China. Electronic address: 2860029852@qq.com.
⁴ School of the Environment, Nanjing University, State Key Laboratory for Pollution Control and Resource Reuse (SKL-PCRR), Nanjing University Xianlin Campus, Xianlin Avenue 163, Nanjing, 210023, China. Electronic address: 1035227946@qq.com.
⁵ School of the Environment, Nanjing University, State Key Laboratory for Pollution Control and Resource Reuse (SKL-PCRR), Nanjing University Xianlin Campus, Xianlin Avenue 163, Nanjing, 210023, China. Electronic address: chenhp1101@163.com.
⁶ School of the Environment, Nanjing University, State Key Laboratory for Pollution Control and Resource Reuse (SKL-PCRR), Nanjing University Xianlin Campus, Xianlin Avenue 163, Nanjing, 210023, China. Electronic address: xiaolin@nju.edu.cn.

PMID: 30071433
DOI: 10.1016/j.chemosphere.2018.07.067

Abstract

To enhance nitrogen removal efficiency, a new electrolysis augmented constructed wetland (E-CW) was applied for nitrogen removal from waste water treatment plant (WWTP) effluent. This work demonstrated that E-CW could remove NO₃^- efficiently (45.5%-83.4%) under low C_COD/N ratio (average 2.29 ± 0.45) with little amount of NH₄⁺ and NO₂^- generation. High throughput 16S rRNA sequence analysis revealed that Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria, Cyanobacteria, Bacteroidetes, and Verrucomicrobia were the dominant phyla in the E-CW. However, abundance of denitrifiers and denitrification genes decreased along with the operation of E-CW. Four functional gene pairs of anammox-amoA, (narG + napA)-(nirK + nirS), (narG + napA)-nosZ and qnorB-nosZ showed positive correlations with each other. Co-occurrence network analysis results indicated that functional guilds of FeOB and FeRB coupled with denitrifiers and contributed to the process of nitrogen removal in the E-CW. Overall, this work illustrated E-CW was a feasible and effective technology for enhancing nitrogen removal, and provided a theoretical basis for better design and operation of E-CW.

Keywords: Bacterial community; Denitrification; Electrolysis augmented constructed wetland; Functional gene group; Network analysis.

MeSH terms

Denitrification / genetics*
Network Meta-Analysis
Nitrogen Cycle / genetics*
Wastewater / microbiology*
Wetlands*

Substances

Waste Water