Cargando…
Nitrogen Removal Capacity of Microbial Communities Developing in Compost- and Woodchip-Based Multipurpose Reactive Barriers for Aquifer Recharge With Wastewater
Global water supplies are threatened by climate changes and the expansion of urban areas, which have led to an increasing interest in nature-based solutions for water reuse and reclamation. Reclaimed water is a possible resource for recharging aquifers, and the addition of an organic reactive barrie...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
---|---|
Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Frontiers Media S.A.
2022
|
Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9171435/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35685927 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2022.877990 |
_version_ | 1784721665263927296 |
---|---|
author | Hellman, Maria Valhondo, Cristina Martínez-Landa, Lurdes Carrera, Jesús Juhanson, Jaanis Hallin, Sara |
author_facet | Hellman, Maria Valhondo, Cristina Martínez-Landa, Lurdes Carrera, Jesús Juhanson, Jaanis Hallin, Sara |
author_sort | Hellman, Maria |
collection | PubMed |
description | Global water supplies are threatened by climate changes and the expansion of urban areas, which have led to an increasing interest in nature-based solutions for water reuse and reclamation. Reclaimed water is a possible resource for recharging aquifers, and the addition of an organic reactive barrier has been proposed to improve the removal of pollutants. There has been a large focus on organic pollutants, but less is known about multifunctional barriers, that is, how barriers also remove nutrients that threaten groundwater ecosystems. Herein, we investigated how compost- and woodchip-based barriers affect nitrogen (N) removal in a pilot soil aquifer treatment facility designed for removing nutrients and recalcitrant compounds by investigating the composition of microbial communities and their capacity for N transformations. Secondary-treated, ammonium-rich wastewater was infiltrated through the barriers, and the changes in the concentration of ammonium, nitrate, and dissolved organic carbon (DOC) were measured after passage through the barrier during 1 year of operation. The development and composition of the microbial community in the barriers were examined, and potential N-transforming processes in the barriers were quantified by determining the abundance of key functional genes using quantitative PCR. Only one barrier, based on compost, significantly decreased the ammonium concentration in the infiltrated water. However, the reduction of reactive N in the barriers was moderate (between 21 and 37%), and there were no differences between the barrier types. All the barriers were after 1 year dominated by members of Alphaproteobacteria, Gammaproteobacteria, and Actinobacteria, although the community composition differed between the barriers. Bacterial classes belonging to the phylum Chloroflexi showed an increased relative abundance in the compost-based barriers. In contrast to the increased genetic potential for nitrification in the compost-based barriers, the woodchip-based barrier demonstrated higher genetic potentials for denitrification, nitrous oxide reduction, and dissimilatory reduction of nitrate to ammonium. The barriers have previously been shown to display a high capacity to degrade recalcitrant pollutants, but in this study, we show that most barriers performed poorly in terms of N removal and those based on compost also leaked DOC, highlighting the difficulties in designing barriers that satisfactorily meet several purposes. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-9171435 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2022 |
publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-91714352022-06-08 Nitrogen Removal Capacity of Microbial Communities Developing in Compost- and Woodchip-Based Multipurpose Reactive Barriers for Aquifer Recharge With Wastewater Hellman, Maria Valhondo, Cristina Martínez-Landa, Lurdes Carrera, Jesús Juhanson, Jaanis Hallin, Sara Front Microbiol Microbiology Global water supplies are threatened by climate changes and the expansion of urban areas, which have led to an increasing interest in nature-based solutions for water reuse and reclamation. Reclaimed water is a possible resource for recharging aquifers, and the addition of an organic reactive barrier has been proposed to improve the removal of pollutants. There has been a large focus on organic pollutants, but less is known about multifunctional barriers, that is, how barriers also remove nutrients that threaten groundwater ecosystems. Herein, we investigated how compost- and woodchip-based barriers affect nitrogen (N) removal in a pilot soil aquifer treatment facility designed for removing nutrients and recalcitrant compounds by investigating the composition of microbial communities and their capacity for N transformations. Secondary-treated, ammonium-rich wastewater was infiltrated through the barriers, and the changes in the concentration of ammonium, nitrate, and dissolved organic carbon (DOC) were measured after passage through the barrier during 1 year of operation. The development and composition of the microbial community in the barriers were examined, and potential N-transforming processes in the barriers were quantified by determining the abundance of key functional genes using quantitative PCR. Only one barrier, based on compost, significantly decreased the ammonium concentration in the infiltrated water. However, the reduction of reactive N in the barriers was moderate (between 21 and 37%), and there were no differences between the barrier types. All the barriers were after 1 year dominated by members of Alphaproteobacteria, Gammaproteobacteria, and Actinobacteria, although the community composition differed between the barriers. Bacterial classes belonging to the phylum Chloroflexi showed an increased relative abundance in the compost-based barriers. In contrast to the increased genetic potential for nitrification in the compost-based barriers, the woodchip-based barrier demonstrated higher genetic potentials for denitrification, nitrous oxide reduction, and dissimilatory reduction of nitrate to ammonium. The barriers have previously been shown to display a high capacity to degrade recalcitrant pollutants, but in this study, we show that most barriers performed poorly in terms of N removal and those based on compost also leaked DOC, highlighting the difficulties in designing barriers that satisfactorily meet several purposes. Frontiers Media S.A. 2022-05-24 /pmc/articles/PMC9171435/ /pubmed/35685927 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2022.877990 Text en Copyright © 2022 Hellman, Valhondo, Martínez-Landa, Carrera, Juhanson and Hallin. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. |
spellingShingle | Microbiology Hellman, Maria Valhondo, Cristina Martínez-Landa, Lurdes Carrera, Jesús Juhanson, Jaanis Hallin, Sara Nitrogen Removal Capacity of Microbial Communities Developing in Compost- and Woodchip-Based Multipurpose Reactive Barriers for Aquifer Recharge With Wastewater |
title | Nitrogen Removal Capacity of Microbial Communities Developing in Compost- and Woodchip-Based Multipurpose Reactive Barriers for Aquifer Recharge With Wastewater |
title_full | Nitrogen Removal Capacity of Microbial Communities Developing in Compost- and Woodchip-Based Multipurpose Reactive Barriers for Aquifer Recharge With Wastewater |
title_fullStr | Nitrogen Removal Capacity of Microbial Communities Developing in Compost- and Woodchip-Based Multipurpose Reactive Barriers for Aquifer Recharge With Wastewater |
title_full_unstemmed | Nitrogen Removal Capacity of Microbial Communities Developing in Compost- and Woodchip-Based Multipurpose Reactive Barriers for Aquifer Recharge With Wastewater |
title_short | Nitrogen Removal Capacity of Microbial Communities Developing in Compost- and Woodchip-Based Multipurpose Reactive Barriers for Aquifer Recharge With Wastewater |
title_sort | nitrogen removal capacity of microbial communities developing in compost- and woodchip-based multipurpose reactive barriers for aquifer recharge with wastewater |
topic | Microbiology |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9171435/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35685927 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2022.877990 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT hellmanmaria nitrogenremovalcapacityofmicrobialcommunitiesdevelopingincompostandwoodchipbasedmultipurposereactivebarriersforaquiferrechargewithwastewater AT valhondocristina nitrogenremovalcapacityofmicrobialcommunitiesdevelopingincompostandwoodchipbasedmultipurposereactivebarriersforaquiferrechargewithwastewater AT martinezlandalurdes nitrogenremovalcapacityofmicrobialcommunitiesdevelopingincompostandwoodchipbasedmultipurposereactivebarriersforaquiferrechargewithwastewater AT carrerajesus nitrogenremovalcapacityofmicrobialcommunitiesdevelopingincompostandwoodchipbasedmultipurposereactivebarriersforaquiferrechargewithwastewater AT juhansonjaanis nitrogenremovalcapacityofmicrobialcommunitiesdevelopingincompostandwoodchipbasedmultipurposereactivebarriersforaquiferrechargewithwastewater AT hallinsara nitrogenremovalcapacityofmicrobialcommunitiesdevelopingincompostandwoodchipbasedmultipurposereactivebarriersforaquiferrechargewithwastewater |