Bioremediation methods have been successfully applied to the removal of organic pollutants for decades, but the responses of the microbial community to environmental factors remain less well known. In this work, the degradation rates of petroleum hydrocarbons (PHs) reached up to 50.11% ± 2.74% after optimizing the degradation conditions. Under the influence of the optimized degradation conditions, the diversity of the bacterial community gradually increased. Meanwhile, the dominant bacterial genera, encompassing Burkholderia-Paraburkholderia, Luteibacter, and Acinetobacter, remained stable. Moreover, statistical analysis indicated that the genera Bacterium, Burkholderia-Paraburkholderia, Luteibacter, and Acinetobacter contributed the most to PHs degradation. Additionally, the functional modules of amino acid metabolism, carbohydrate metabolism, as well as global and overview maps played a vital role in the metabolization of PHs. Therefore, understanding the changes of the microbial community structure and function can provide valuable guidance to further improve the degradation rate of organic waste via bioremediation methods.
Keywords: Activated sludge; Bacterial community function; Bacterial community structure; Bioremediation; Petroleum hydrocarbons.