Diversity and Composition of Sulfate-Reducing Microbial Communities Based on Genomic DNA and RNA Transcription in Production Water of High Temperature and Corrosive Oil Reservoir.

Xiao-Xiao Li,Lei Zhou,Bo-Zhong Mu,Serge M. Mbadinga,Jin-Feng Liu,Shi-Zhong Yang,Ji-Dong Gu

doi:10.3389/fmicb.2017.01011

Abstract

Deep subsurface petroleum reservoir ecosystems harbor a high diversity of microorganisms, and microbial influenced corrosion is a major problem for the petroleum industry. Here, we used high-throughput sequencing to explore the microbial communities based on genomic 16S rDNA and metabolically active 16S rRNA analyses of production water samples with different extents of corrosion from a high-temperature oil reservoir. Results showed that Desulfotignum and Roseovarius were the most abundant genera in both genomic and active bacterial communities of all the samples. Both genomic and active archaeal communities were mainly composed of Archaeoglobus and Methanolobus. Within both bacteria and archaea, the active and genomic communities were compositionally distinct from one another across the different oil wells (bacteria p = 0.002; archaea p = 0.01). In addition, the sulfate-reducing microorganisms (SRMs) were specifically assessed by Sanger sequencing of functional genes aprA and dsrA encoding the enzymes adenosine-5′-phosphosulfate reductase and dissimilatory sulfite reductase, respectively. Functional gene analysis indicated that potentially active Archaeoglobus, Desulfotignum, Desulfovibrio, and Thermodesulforhabdus were frequently detected, with Archaeoglobus as the most abundant and active sulfate-reducing group. Canonical correspondence analysis revealed that the SRM communities in petroleum reservoir system were closely related to pH of the production water and sulfate concentration. This study highlights the importance of distinguishing the metabolically active microorganisms from the genomic community and extends our knowledge on the active SRM communities in corrosive petroleum reservoirs.

Highlights

Metal corrosion is a major problem for oil production systems, leading to serious economic and safety as well as human health problems (Koch et al, 2002; Guan et al, 2014)
The gene transcript levels of bacterial 16S rRNA and dsrA were assessed with quantitative polymerase chain reaction (PCR)
The ratios of dsrA to the 16S rRNA gene transcripts copy numbers were used to determine the relative abundances of active sulfatereducing microorganisms (SRMs) in the whole community, and the ratios ranged from 0.54 to 1.02% in these samples (Figure 1D)

Summary

Introduction

Metal corrosion is a major problem for oil production systems, leading to serious economic and safety as well as human health problems (Koch et al, 2002; Guan et al, 2014). Microbial groups of sulfate-reducing microorganism (SRM), acid-producing fermentative microorganisms, metal-reducers and methanogens are frequently detected in oil transporting pipeline systems (Duncan et al, 2009; Stevenson et al, 2011; Liang et al, 2014). Recent studies showed that some SRM were capable of iron corrosion via electron extraction from Fe0 and the process is referred to as electrical microbial influenced corrosion (EMIC) (Enning et al, 2012; Enning and Garrelfs, 2013) Other microorganisms, such as metal-reducers, acid-producing fermentative microorganisms and methanogens may contribute to corrosion through different biochemical processes (Zhang et al, 2003; Enning and Garrelfs, 2013; Kip and Veen, 2014; Usher et al, 2014). It has been reported that thiosulfate-utilizing, sulfide-producing fermentative bacteria such as Anaerobaculum sp. were implicated with the biocorrosion of a high-temperature petroleum facility (Liang et al, 2014)

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