Nitrifying Bacteria in Wastewater Reservoirs

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Deep wastewater reservoirs are used throughout Israel to store domestic wastewater effluents for summer irrigation. These effluents contain high concentrations of ammonia (≤5 mM) that are frequently toxic to photosynthetic microorganisms and that lead to development of anoxic conditions. Population dynamics of nitrifying bacteria and rates of nitrification were studied in two wastewater reservoirs that differed in organic load and degree of oxygenation and in the laboratory under controlled conditions, both by serial dilutions in mineral medium and microscopically with fluorescein isothiocyanate-conjugated antibodies prepared against local isolates. The difference in counts by the two methods was within 1 order of magnitude. In the laboratory, an O2 concentration of 0.2 mg liter−1 was close to optimal with respect to growth of NH3 oxidizers on domestic wastewater, while O2 concentrations of 0.05 mg liter−1 supported significant rates of nitrification. It was found that even hypertrophic anaerobic environments such as the anaerobic hypolimnion of the wastewater reservoir or the anaerobic settling ponds are capable of sustaining a viable, although not actively nitrifying, population of Nitrosomonas spp. and Nitrobacter spp., in contrast to their rapid decline when maintained anaerobically in mineral medium in the laboratory. Nitrification rates of NH3 in effluents during storage in the reservoirs were slower by 1 to 2 orders of magnitude compared with corresponding rates in water samples brought to the laboratory. The factors causing this inhibition were not identified.

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