This study reports a structured investigation on the degradation kinetics of different types (gyrAR,tetAR, qnrSR) and conformational forms (chromosomal, plasmids) of ARGs and mobile genetic elements (intl-1, plasmids) as a function of water matrix (DI water, phosphate buffer, wastewater) with UV and UV/H2O2 treatments. Extracellular, intracellular and the free-ARGs fate were tracked to infer the impact of various parameters on the degradation efficacy of the treatment process. The degradation profile of e-ARGs (118-454 bp) showed 1-4 log reductions but did not correlate strongly to amplicon size indicating the importance of active sites distribution and/or types of ARGs for UV induced gene damage. The i-ARGs showed similar degradation rates compared to e-ARGs for UV in phosphate buffer (PBS) but showed (1.3-2 times) slower rates for i-ARGs with UV/H2O2 due to scavenging of OH radicals by the cellular components. While the ARB inactivation was effective, but ARG damage was not supplemental as i-ARGs and f-ARGs persisted. In the wastewater matrix, generation of radical species was contributing to improved degradation rates from UV/H2O2 treatment, specifically for f-ARGs resulting in significantly improved degradation (p<0.05) compared to PBS. These indicates a non-selective nature of attack from radical species generated from UV irradiation on the effluent organic matter (EfOM) than sequenced based damage to the genes from UV. For the plasmid degradation, conformational differences pertaining to the supercoiled structures and intracellular forms influenced slower (1.2-2.8 times) UV mediated gene damage rate as opposed to chromosomal ARGs. These results can be useful for better assessing UV based treatment processes for effective ARG removal.
Keywords: Advanced oxidation process; Antibiotic resistant bacteria; Antibiotic resistant genes; Degradation kinetics; Free ARGs; Mobile genetic elements; UV; UV/H(2)O(2).
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