Removal Efficacy of Opportunistic Pathogens and Bacterial Community Dynamics in Two Drinking Water Treatment Trains.

Drinking water treatment processes (DWTPs) impact pathogen colonization and microbial communities in finished water; however, their efficacies against opportunistic pathogens are not fully understood. In this study, the effects of treatment steps on the removal of Legionella spp., Legionella pneumophila, nontuberculous mycobacteria, Mycobacterium avium, and two amoeba hosts (Vermamoeba vermiformis, Acanthamoeba) are evaluated in two parallel trains of DWTPs equipped with different pretreatment units. Quantitative polymerase chain reaction analysis demonstrates significantly reduced numbers of total bacteria, Legionella, and mycobacteria during ozonation, followed by a rebound in granular activated carbon (GAC) filtration, whereas sand filtration exerts an overarching effect in removing microorganisms in both treatment trains. V. vermiformis is more prevalent in biofilm (34%) than water samples (7.7%), while Acanthamoeba is not found in the two trains of DWTPs. Illumina sequencing of bacterial 16S rRNA genes reveals significant community shifts at different treatment steps, as well as distinct bacterial community structures in water and biofilm samples in parallel units (e.g., ozonation, GAC, sand filtration) between the two trains (analysis of similarities (ANOSIM), p < 0.05), implying the potential influence of different pretreatment steps in shaping the downstream microbiome. Overall, the results provide insights to mitigation of opportunistic pathogens and engineer approaches for managing bacterial communities in DWTPs.

Comparison of microbial community shifts in two parallel multi-step drinking water treatment processes.

Drinking water treatment processes remove undesirable chemicals and microorganisms from source water, which is vital to public health protection. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of treatment processes and configuration on the microbiome by comparing microbial community shifts in two series of different treatment processes operated in parallel within a full-scale drinking water treatment plant (DWTP) in Southeast China. Illumina sequencing of 16S rRNA genes of water samples demonstrated little effect of coagulation/sedimentation and pre-oxidation steps on bacterial communities, in contrast to dramatic and concurrent microbial community shifts during ozonation, granular activated carbon treatment, sand filtration, and disinfection for both series. A large number of unique operational taxonomic units (OTUs) at these four treatment steps further illustrated their strong shaping power towards the drinking water microbial communities. Interestingly, multidimensional scaling analysis revealed tight clustering of biofilm samples collected from different treatment steps, with Nitrospira, the nitrite-oxidizing bacteria, noted at higher relative abundances in biofilm compared to water samples. Overall, this study provides a snapshot of step-to-step microbial evolvement in multi-step drinking water treatment systems, and the results provide insight to control and manipulation of the drinking water microbiome via optimization of DWTP design and operation.