Abstract
Karoon River is the most important river in Iran that supplies the drinking and industrial water to many cities and villages in Khuzestan. As a consequence of hospital and municipal wastewater discharge into this river, antibiotic resistance will be increased in microbial inhabitants of this ecosystem. Furthermore, microbial load is also undergone continual variation. The aim of this study was to evaluate seasonal microbial quality and antibiotic resistance in bacterial isolates. For this purpose, five stations were selected and samples were harvested during four seasons. Bacterial count was performed through culturing on Mueller–Hinton agar, and bacterial isolates were identified. Antibiotic resistance profiles of isolates as well as resistance to Hg were investigated. As a result, it was found that the least quality was in summer season while the best quality was in winter that is related to the reduction of water volume and recreational activities in summer and increasing rain and dilution of contaminants in winter season. All isolates were sensitive to Hg while antibiotic resistance and multidrug resistance were found in bacterial isolates. Based on the obtained results, it can be concluded that the microbial quality of Karoon River has variations depending on the season and it is necessary that be monitored in order to control and prevent epidemic bacterial infections and antibiotic resistance distribution.
Highlights
Humans were resided around the rivers and following this, cities, agriculture and industries were developed near the rivers
Evaluation of physical and chemical parameters of the water samples including pH, electrical conductivity (EC), dissolved oxygen (DO), chemical oxygen demand (COD), BOD5 and the results of their counting bacteria in different cultures are presented in Tables 3, 4 and 5
The results of this research showed that there is high microbial count in the sampled waters from Karoon; dependent on the season and station of sampling, this microbial load was varied. With regard to these results, it can be concluded that the discharge of different wastewaters and agricultural drainage to this river had adverse effects on the quality of water in such a manner that the worst quality was recorded in station 5 that is located in downstream of Ahvaz city
Summary
Humans were resided around the rivers and following this, cities, agriculture and industries were developed near the rivers. Rivers are one of the most vital sources for water supplying for humans (Sánchez et al 2007; Simeonov et al 2003). Due to increase in agricultural and industrial activities and water pollution, the available water resources have been limited. Management and quality control of water resources is necessary (Fataei 2012). Karoon River is the longest river in Iran
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