Identifying potential introduced and natural sources of pollution in Delaware watersheds Applied and Environmental Microbiology

Managing water quality with microbial impairment caused by Enterococcus poses unique challenges regarding the determination of fecal host origin. Most water monitoring is performed based on Enterococcus counts that neither detect the location of the introduction of pollution nor identify the type of contaminating Enterococcus. The use of sequenced-based microbial source tracking could allow for identification of fecal origin and potential remediation of pollution. The state of Delaware has numerous waterways with high microbial impairment from unknown sources, so we used sequence-based microbial source tracking to investigate potential microbial pollution in three watersheds with significant variation in land use and population density. In this study, we use a 16S rRNA sequence reference library of microbial communities from relevant fecal sources (wild animal, domestic animal, sediment, and septic/wastewater) to determine the most likely sources of microbial impairment in three Delaware watersheds. This study assigned sources of microbial contamination to mostly human-related sources (septic and wastewater) or unknown sources indicating that waste infrastructure may have a larger influence on microbial community structure in Delaware watersheds than previously considered. Our results suggest that long-term source tracking is valuable for ruling out native or domesticated animals as contributors to water pollution. Grant no. NA180AR4170086