Journal Article

Linkages of Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes populations to methanogenic process performance

He, Qiang, Wyckoff, Kristen N, Chen, Si, Cheng, Huicai

2016

Overview

Abstract To identify potential linkages between specific bacterial populations and process performance in anaerobic digestion, the dynamics of bacterial community structure was monitored with high-throughput sequencing in triplicate anaerobic digesters treating animal waste. Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes were found as the two most abundant populations, however, with contrasting population dynamics in response to organic overloading. Firmicutes dominated the bacterial community during stable process performance at low organic loading rate, representing over 50 % of the bacterial abundance. In contrast, the onset of organic overloading raised the relative abundance of Bacteroidetes from 20 ± 2.6 to 44 ± 3.1 %. In addition to the significant negative correlation between the relative abundance of Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes, populations of Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes were found to be linked to process parameters including organic loading rate, volatile fatty acids concentration, and methane production. Therefore, the population abundance ratio of Firmicutes to Bacteroidetes (F/B ratio) was suggested as a potential indicator for process performance. The interactions between Firmicutes and Bacteroidetes populations could be exploited to develop strategies for the prevention of performance perturbation in anaerobic digestion processes.

• Publisher: Oxford University Press,Springer Berlin Heidelberg
• Subject: Alternative energy sources / anaerobic digesters / Anaerobic digestion / Anaerobiosis / Analysis / Animal wastes / Bacteria / bacterial communities / Bacteroidetes - metabolism / Biochemistry / Bioinformatics / Biomass / Biomedical and Life Sciences / Biotechnology / Community structure / DNA, Bacterial - isolation & purification / Environmental Microbiology / fatty acid composition / Fatty acids / Fatty Acids, Volatile - biosynthesis / Fermentation / Firmicutes / Firmicutes - metabolism / Genetic Engineering / high-throughput nucleotide sequencing / Industrial Microbiology / Inorganic Chemistry / Life Sciences / Load distribution / Manures / Methane / Methane - biosynthesis / methane production / methanogens / Microbiology / Organic loading / Organic waste treatment / Phylogeny / Population / population dynamics / Poultry / Relative abundance / Sequence Analysis, DNA / Studies / Thermal cycling / volatile fatty acids / Waste disposal / Waste treatment