UV disinfection of Staphylococcus aureus in ballast water: Effect of growth phase on the disinfection kinetics and the mechanization at molecular level

Abstract

This work aimed to study the inactivate kinetics of Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) in artificial seawater by ultraviolet radiation, establish relationships between model parameters and growth phases, and explain the mechanization of UV disinfection by molecular biological detection. Investigations were carried out for the validation of Chick-Watson, Collins-Selleck, Hom and Biphasic models when S. aureus was in stationary phase (t=14 h). The results showed that the Biphasic kinetic model’s R 2 turned out to be the highest one (R 2=0.9892) and RMSE was less than 0.5 (RMSE =0.2699). The Biphasic kinetic model was better fit for ultraviolet disinfection than the other three models under the circumstance of this experiment and chosen to fit the ultraviolet disinfection curves for microorganisms at three growth phases. The sensitivity of microorganisms under ultraviolet radiation was in the following order: in exponential phase > in stationary phase > in lag phase by comparing the indexes of the Biphasic model (k 1 and x). Besides, agarose gel electrophoresis was used in order to directly assess the damage to DNA of microorganisms that were exposed to the different dose of UV irradiation. The results revealed that DNA damage caused by UV radiation was an important reason for the microorganism inactivation and as the UV dose increased, there was greater damage caused in DNA.