The distance decay of microbial community composition in municipal wastewater treatment bioreactors

Understanding the spatiotemporal patterns of biodiversity is a central goal of ecology. The objective of this study was to better understand the biogeography of activated sludge microbial communities, which are practically important for the protection of surface water quality. Monthly samples were collected from 20 facilities (25 bioreactors) within 442-km of each other for one year.