Trichloroethylene removal and bacterial variations in the up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket reactor in response to temperature shifts.

Trichloroethylene (TCE) degradation and the variations of bacteria composition and structure in the up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) reactor were investigated by increasing the operating temperature from 20 to 40 °C. The influent was supplemented with 36.5 mg/L of TCE. There was a rise in the chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal efficiency from 20 to 35 °C and a decline when temperature enhanced to 40 °C. It reached maximum at 35 °C. In addition, TCE removal efficiency increased with temperature varying from 20 to 35 °C, and it dropped dramatically to 78.38 % at 40 °C, which presumably because the genus of Dehalobacter, a kind of bacteria with the ability to dechlorinate TCE to the corresponding chlorinated products, was not detected at 40 °C according to sequencing results. The Illumina MiSeq platform was adopted to explore the bacteria composition and structure in response to temperature shifts. The results indicated that temperature impacted greatly on the dominance and presence of specific populations at different taxonomic levels. Importantly, the class Dehalococcoidia was detected from 25 to 40 °C, in which there were many well-known Dehalococcoides sp. strains that were capable of complete dechlorination of TCE to ethene. It also suggested the potential function of the dominant genera (non-dechlorinating bacteria and dechlorinating bacteria) in the reactor.