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Frontiers of Environmental Science & Engineering

ISSN 2095-2201

ISSN 2095-221X(Online)

CN 10-1013/X

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Front. Environ. Sci. Eng.    2019, Vol. 13 Issue (1) : 15    https://doi.org/10.1007/s11783-019-1100-0
RESEARCH ARTICLE
Effect of biological activated carbon filter depth and backwashing process on transformation of biofilm community
Wanqi Qi1, Weiying Li1,2(), Junpeng Zhang1, Xuan Wu1, Jie Zhang1, Wei Zhang3
1. College of Environmental Science and Engineering, Tongji University, Shanghai 200092, China
2. State Key Laboratory of Pollution Control and Resource Reuse, Tongji University, Shanghai 200092, China
3. Chengdu Chuanli Intelligence Fluid Equipment Co., Ltd., Chengdu 611530, China
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Abstract

We studied BAC biofilm during the process of initial operation and backwash.

Microbial diversity decreased gradually with the increase of BAC filter depth.

Proteobacteria dominated at the phylum level among the BAC biofilm samples.

α-proteobacteria increased about 10% in all carbon filter depth after backwash.

The biological activated carbon (BAC) is a popular advanced water treatment to the provision of safe water supply. A bench-scale device was designed to gain a better insight into microbial diversity and community structure of BAC biofilm by using high-throughput sequencing method. Both samples of BAC biofilm (the first, third and fifth month) and water (inlet water and outlet water of carbon filter, outlet water of backwashing) were analyzed to evaluate the impact of carbon filter depth, running time and backwash process. The results showed that the microbial diversity of biofilm decreased generally with the increase of carbon filter depth and biofilm reached a steady-state at the top layer of BAC after three months’ running. Proteobacteria (71.02%–95.61%) was found to be dominant bacteria both in biofilms and water samples. As one of opportunistic pathogen, the Pseudomonas aeruginosa in the outlet water of device (1.20%) was about eight times higher than that in the inlet water of device (0.16%) at the genus level after five-month operation. To maintain the safety of drinking water, the backwash used in this test could significantly remove Sphingobacteria (from 8.69% to 5.09%, p<0.05) of carbon biofilm. After backwashing, the operational taxonomic units (OTUs) number and the Shannon index decreased significantly (p<0.05) at the bottom of carbon column and we found the Proteobacteria increased by about 10% in all biofilm samples from different filter depth. This study reveals the transformation of BAC biofilm with the impact of running time and backwashing.
Keywords Biological activated carbon      Biofilm      Community structure      Carbon filter depth      High-throughput sequencing     
Corresponding Author(s): Weiying Li   
Issue Date: 27 December 2018
 Cite this article:   
Wanqi Qi,Weiying Li,Junpeng Zhang, et al. Effect of biological activated carbon filter depth and backwashing process on transformation of biofilm community[J]. Front. Environ. Sci. Eng., 2019, 13(1): 15.
 URL:  
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fese/EN/10.1007/s11783-019-1100-0
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fese/EN/Y2019/V13/I1/15
Fig.1  Device of ozone-active carbon.
Water quality index Inlet water Outlet water
Turbidity (NTU) 0.62±0.28 0.36±0.26
TOC (mg/L) 3.535±0.665 2.015±0.625
AOC (mg/L) 104.30±7.00 62.95±27.85
DO (mg/L) 2.55±0.40 1.09±0.68
Tab.1  Inlet and outlet water quality of ozone-active carbon device during the whole operation
Sample ID Sample information Sample ID Sample information
A10 1st month, 10 cm carbon sample C70 5th month, 70 cm carbon sample
A30 1st month, 30 cm carbon sample D10 after backwash, 10 cm carbon sample
B10 3rd month, 10 cm carbon sample D30 after backwash, 30 cm carbon sample
B30 3rd month, 30 cm carbon sample D50 after backwash, 50cm carbon sample
B50 3rd month, 50 cm carbon sample D70 after backwash, 70 cm carbon sample
B70 3rd month, 70 cm carbon sample E 5th month, inlet water of carbon column
C10 5th month, 10 cm carbon sample F 5th month, outlet water of carbon column
C30 5th month, 30 cm carbon sample G 5th month, backwash drainage
C50 5th month, 50 cm carbon sample
Tab.2  Sample ID and sample information of carbon
Sample ID Reads 0.97
OTUs Ace Chao Coverage Shannon Simpson
A10 26377 295 349 335 0.997725 3.47 0.0625
A30 30513 281 349 367 0.997706 3.19 0.0784
B10 27246 424 482 485 0.997174 4.26 0.0336
B30 32215 429 510 527 0.997175 3.87 0.0511
B50 38839 428 496 488 0.997992 3.81 0.0527
B70 29963 382 439 439 0.997564 3.63 0.0616
C10 25323 424 483 482 0.997038 4.27 0.0313
C30 23833 450 499 513 0.996853 4.22 0.0413
C50 28095 454 509 524 0.997224 4.14 0.0418
C70 24694 421 479 475 0.996882 3.83 0.0574
D10 26798 449 518 521 0.996753 4.04 0.047
D30 34666 509 540 539 0.998327 4.31 0.0389
D50 28656 479 525 540 0.997453 4.12 0.0477
D70 22232 394 485 484 0.995592 3.43 0.0803
E 22896 484 505 512 0.997638 4.24 0.0622
F 23340 439 470 468 0.997729 4.56 0.0254
G 23958 512 533 532 0.998038 4.69 0.0245
Tab.3  Community richness and diversity indices for biofilm and water samples (Statistical analysis of biological information based on OTUs partitioning for all sequences at 97% similar level)
Fig.2  Assimilable organic carbon (AOC) of outlet water samples in different carbon filter depth with running time.
Fig.3  Heterotrophic plate count (HPC) of different carbon filter outlet water samples in the whole operation.
Fig.4  Shannon curves of all BAC biofilm and water samples (group A: BAC biofilm samples in the 1st month, group B: BAC biofilm samples in the 3rd month, group C: BAC biofilm samples in the 5th month, group D: BAC biofilm samples in the 5th month after backwashing operation, group E: sample of inlet water in the 5th month, group F: sample of outlet water in the 5th month, group G: samples of backwash drainage in the 5th month).
Fig.5  The microbial community structure from all BAC biofilm and water samples at (a) class level, sequences unclassified to any known classes are included as others, the rare species with relative abundance less than 0.1% are included as others, phylum to which the class belongs are also listed in the diagram, (b) classified genera (top 30, percentage color chart listed on the right).
Fig.6  Correlation of taxa abundances in different months (a) at class level, (b) at genus level. R was the Pearson correlation coefficient for the time value against the relative abundance in all BAC biofilm samples.
Fig.7  Principle composition analysis of microbial at OTUs level.
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