Project description:Two parallel anaerobic digestion lines were designed to match a "bovid-like" digestive structure. Each of the lines consisted of two Continuous Stirred Tank Reactors placed in series and separated by an acidic treatment step. The first line was inoculated with industrial inocula whereas the second was seeded with cow digestive tract contents. After three month of continuous sewage sludge feeding, samples were recovered for shotgun metaproteomic and DNA-based analysis. Strikingly, protein inferred and 16S rDNA tags based taxonomic community profiles were not fully consistent. Principal Component analysis however revealed a similar clustering pattern of the samples, suggesting that reproducible methodological and/or biological factors underlie this observation. The performances of the two digestion lines did not differ significantly and the cow derived inocula did not establish in the reactors. A low throughput metagenomic dataset (3.4x106 reads, 1.1 Gb) was also generated for one of the samples. It allowed a substantial increase of the analysis depth (increase of the spectral identification rate). For the first time, a high level of proteins expressed by members of the "Candidatus Competibacter" group is reported in an anaerobic digester, a key microbial player in environmental bioprocess communities.
Project description:Hepatic transcriptional profiling of fish exposed to sewage to evaluate temporal and concentration trends. Two experiments (Year 1 and 2), each with 6 concentrations (0%, 0.05%, 0.1%, 0.7%, 2% and 5/10%) of sewage diluted in seawater at 4 timepoints (1, 4, 8 and 16 days).
Project description:Effluents from sewage treatment plants contain a mixture of micropollutants with the potential of harming aquatic organisms. Thus, addition of advanced treatment techniques to complement existing conventional methods has been proposed. Some of the advanced techniques could, however, potentially produce additional compounds affecting exposed organisms by unknown modes of action. In the present study the aim was to improve our understanding of how exposure to different sewage effluents affects fish. This was achieved by explorative microarray and quantitative PCR analyses of hepatic gene expression, as well as relative organ sizes of rainbow trout exposed to different sewage effluents (conventionally treated, granular activated carbon, ozonation (5 or 15 mg/L), 5 mg/L ozone plus a moving bed biofilm reactor, or UV-light treatment in combination with hydrogen peroxide). Exposure to the conventionally treated effluent caused a significant increase in liver and heart somatic indexes, an effect removed by all other treatments. Genes connected to xenobiotic metabolism, including cytochrome p450 1A, were differentially expressed in the fish exposed to the conventionally treated effluents, though only effluent treatment with granular activated carbon or ozone at 15 mg/L completely removed this response. The mRNA expression of heat shock protein 70 kDa was induced in all three groups exposed to ozone-treated effluents, suggesting some form of added stress in these fish. The induction of estrogen-responsive genes in the fish exposed to the conventionally treated effluent was effectively reduced by all investigated advanced treatment technologies, although the moving bed biofilm reactor was least efficient. Taken together, granular activated carbon showed the highest potential of reducing responses in fish induced by exposure to sewage effluents.
Project description:Sewage samples were collected and concentrated for Human and animal viruses. Viruses were cultured on Buffalo Green Monkey Cells (BGMK) and their genomic DNA/RNA were extracted and labeled with Cy3 and Cy5 respectively. Labeled DNA/RNA were hybridized unto the array and signals generated were analyzed to indicate the presence of target viruses. Keywords: Detection of pathogens within environmental sample (Viruses)
