Opening a functional genomic window on anaerobic wastewater digestion processes at municipal scales

废水的厌氧消化是由微生物群落代谢催化的，导致固体和溶解废物转化为潜在有用的产品，包括甲烷(CH4)，也称为沼气，一种高价值的可再生能源和材料资源。不幸的是，商业化规模的厌氧消化器的转化效率低，甲烷产量不稳定，固体残留物也很容易去除。这些限制扰乱了盈利能力，主要是由于目前在消化池环境中控制微生物代谢通量的能力有限。高通量测序技术的最新进展使人们能够前所未有地获得废水处理生态系统中个体、群体和社区层面微生物代谢的遗传蓝图。初步调查发现，包括负荷率、底物类型、停留时间、温度和金属浓度在内的物理和化学参数与微生物群落结构和功能之间存在直接联系。然而，有效的管理和优化策略需要对操作参数、性能指标和微生物群落新陈代谢之间的关系进行时间分辨的洞察。与温哥华麦德龙合作，我们将通过使用高通量测序方法对不列颠哥伦比亚省里士满卢卢岛污水处理厂的厌氧消化器和固体接触池进行时间序列分析，从而发展这一洞察力。由此产生的多组(DNA和RNA)数据集将被用于描述微生物群落的结构和活性，并对代谢潜力进行建模。这些信息将与操作参数和性能指标相结合，以促进在减少固体含量的情况下增加甲烷产率的工艺配置。温哥华麦德龙正在投资100多万加元建立一个试点工厂，并投资1300万加元对工厂进行升级，将沼气池中的甲烷输送到天然气分配设施中。目前的项目对于最大限度地提高这项投资的回报是不可或缺的，因为它提供了必要的数据，以便对驱动卢鲁岛甲烷生产的潜在微生物相互作用进行建模和操纵。

Anaerobic digestion of wastewater is catalyzed by microbial community metabolism resulting in theconversion of solid and dissolved wastes into potentially useful products including methane (CH4), also knownas biogas, a high-value and renewable energy and material resource. Commercial-scale anaerobic digesters,unfortunately, suffer from low conversion efficiencies, variability in CH4 yields and solid residues that can becostly to remove. These limitations confound profitability and arise primarily from limitations in currentcapacity to control microbial metabolic fluxes in the digester milieu. Recent advances in high-throughputsequencing technologies are enabling unprecedented access to the genetic blueprints underlying microbialmetabolism at the individual, population and community levels in wastewater treatment ecosystems. Initialinvestigations have identified direct links between physical and chemical parameters including loading rates,substrate types, residence times, temperature, and metal concentrations, and microbial community structure andfunction. However, effective management and optimization strategies require time-resolved insight into therelationships between operating parameters, performance metrics, and microbial community metabolism. Inpartnership with Metro Vancouver, we will develop this insight through time-series analysis of the anaerobicdigester and solids contact tank at the Lulu Island wastewater treatment plant in Richmond, BC usinghigh-throughput sequencing approaches. Resulting multi-omic (DNA and RNA) data sets will be used toprofile microbial community structure and activity, and model metabolic potential. This information will becombined with operating parameters and performance metrics to promote process configurations that increaseCH4 yields with reduced solids. Metro Vancouver is investing over $1 million CAD in a pilot plant as well as$13 Million CAD into a plant upgrade to feed CH4 from the anaerobic digester into a natural gas distributionfacility. The current project is integral to maximizing return on this investment by providing the data necessaryto model and manipulate underlying microbial interactions driving CH4 production at Lulu Island.