Wastewater Metagenome

This research aimed to characterize the microbial community from biofouled microplastics (MPs), loaded and non-loaded with triclosan (TCS). To achieve this goal, polyethylene MPs (PE-MPs) were exposed to the influent and the effluent from a wastewater treatment plant (WWTP) close to Madrid (Spain) to promote biofouling. The biofouling time frame was four weeks. The resulting biofouled-MPs were put in contact with TCS for four h. Complementarily, samples from wastewater at the beginning and the end of the biofouling period were collected to evaluate possible differences between microbial communities attached to MPs and the free-living organisms in the surrounding media. We applied Illumina sequencing of the V3 and V4 region of the 16S rRNA gene.

本研究旨在表征负载与未负载三氯生（triclosan, TCS）的生物污损微塑料（microplastics, MPs）所附着的微生物群落。为达成该研究目标，将聚乙烯微塑料（PE-MPs）暴露于西班牙马德里附近某污水处理厂（wastewater treatment plant, WWTP）的进水与出水中以促进生物污损，生物污损周期为四周。随后将所得生物污损微塑料与三氯生接触四小时。此外，本研究在生物污损周期的起始与结束阶段采集污水处理厂水样，以对比附着于微塑料的微生物群落与周围介质中自由生活微生物的群落差异。本研究采用针对16S核糖体RNA基因V3与V4区的Illumina测序技术完成群落分析。