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Abstract
Distinct microbial assemblages evolve in anaerobic digestion (AD) reactors to drive sequential conversions of organics to methane. The spatio-temporal development of three such assemblages (granules, biofilms, planktonic) derived from the same inoculum was studied in replicated bioreactors treating long-chain fatty acids (LCFA)-rich wastewater at 20 °C at hydraulic retention times (HRTs) of 12–72 h. We found granular, biofilm and planktonic assemblages differentiated by diversity, structure, and assembly mechanisms; demonstrating a spatial compartmentalisation of the microbiomes from the initial community reservoir. Our analysis linked abundant Methanosaeta and Syntrophaceae-affiliated taxa (Syntrophus and uncultured) to their putative, active roles in syntrophic LCFA bioconversion. LCFA loading rates (stearate, palmitate), and HRT, were significant drivers shaping microbial community dynamics and assembly. This study of the archaea and syntrophic bacteria actively valorising LCFAs at short HRTs and 20 °C will help uncover the microbiology underpinning anaerobic bioconversions of fats, oil and grease.
Highlights
Microbial consortia have been exploited for numerous biotechno logical applications, such as for valorizing wastewaters, principally because mixed-species systems allow for easier management and pro vide more diverse applications than pure-culture set-ups (McCarty and Ledesma-Amaro, 2019)
Treatment of organics, including inhibitory compounds at low temperatures is desirable in anaerobic digestion (AD) systems to improve the net energy yield (Petropoulos et al, 2019), but such conditions are regarded as challenging for optimal functioning of AD consortia
The assemblages were developed in novel, two-compartment bioreactors treating long-chain fatty acids (LCFA)-rich wastewater at low hydraulic retention times (HRTs) (72–12 h) at 20 ◦C, which we previously evaluated and reported (Singh et al, 2020)
Summary
Microbial consortia have been exploited for numerous biotechno logical applications, such as for valorizing wastewaters, principally because mixed-species systems allow for easier management and pro vide more diverse applications than pure-culture set-ups (McCarty and Ledesma-Amaro, 2019). Unveiling microbial assembly mechanisms offers unprecedented in sights into engineered bioconversion systems, such as AD bioreactors (Ferguson et al, 2018). Factors such as inoculum composition (Li et al, 2019; Singh et al, 2019a), substrate composition and loading (Braz et al, 2019; Chen et al, 2019), operational duration (Lucas et al, 2015; Vanwonterghem et al, 2014), and process temperature (Heidrich et al, 2018), were shown as strong drivers of microbial community assembly in various AD systems when operated at hydraulic retention times (HRTs) longer than 10 d. Shorter HRTs (
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