Influence of different temperatures on metal tolerance measurements and growth response in bacterial communities from unpolluted and polluted soils

Abstract

The effects of temperature on the growth rate and metal toxicity in soil bacterial communities extracted from unpolluted and polluted soils were investigated using the thymidine and leucine incorporation techniques. An agricultural soil, which was contaminated in the laboratory with Cu, Cd, Zn, Ni or Pb, and an uncontaminated forest soil were used. Measurements were made at 0°C and 20°C. Leucine incorporation was found to be as sensitive to heavy metals as thymidine incorporation in the short-term trial used to indicate heavy metal tolerance. Similar IC50 values (the log of the metal concentration that reduced incorporation to 50%) were also obtained at 0 and 20°C, independently of the technique used. Metal tolerance could thus be measured using both techniques at any temperature in the range 0–20°C. In the long-term experiment different temperature-growth relationships were obtained on the basis of the rate of thymidine or leucine incorporation into bacterial assemblages from unpolluted and polluted soils, as judged from the minimum temperature values. This could not be attributed to the metal addition alone since different patterns were observed when different metals were added to the soil. Thus, the minimum temperature for thymidine incorporation was similar in Cu-polluted and unpolluted soil, while in soils polluted with Cd and Zn the minimum temperature increased by 2°C, and Ni and Pb additions increased the minimum temperature by 4°C compared to the unpolluted soil. This suggested that heavy metal pollution led to bacterial communities showing different temperature characteristics to those in the corresponding unpolluted soil. Similar observations were deduced from the minimum temperatures required for leucine incorporation. Three groups of bacterial communities were distinguished according to the growth response to temperature in polluted soils, one group in Cu-polluted soil, a second group in soil polluted with Zn and Cd, and a third group in soils polluted with Ni and Pb.