Cell membrane characteristics and microbial population distribution of MBBR and IFAS with different dissolved oxygen concentration

Abstract This paper investigated the influences of different dissolved oxygen (DO) concentration (0.71–1.32, 2.13–3.02 and 4.31–5.16 mg/L) on cell membrane characteristics and microbial population distribution of moving biofilm reactors. Two representative reactors, i.e., moving bed biofilm reactors and integrated fixed-film activated sludge were operated. Results indicated that both DO concentration of 0.71–1.32 mg/L and 4.31–5.16 mg/L could increase membrane lipid mobile fraction (49.4%-67.4%) of the microbes, however, through prompting the synthesis of branched fatty acids and unsaturated fatty acids, respectively. For the biofilms, the abundance of Bacteroidetes decreased and Actinobacteria increased with the increase of DO levels. The lowest EfOM content and the highest microbial diversities (1.14–1.52) was observed at DO of 2.13–3.02 mg/L. Redundancy analysis showed that changes of DO levels could alter cell membrane properties and bacterial community structures, and subsequently significantly influenced effluent organic matter composition of moving biofilm reactors.