[Effect of Low-concentration Ciprofloxacin on the Nitrification and Nitrifying Microorganisms of Biofilms in Biological Aerated Filter].

Effect of low-concentration ciprofloxacin (CIP) on nitrification and nitrifying microorganisms of biofilms was studied in biological aerated filters (BAF). Quantitative PCR (qPCR) was used to determine the abundance variance of four ciprofloxacin resistance genes (CIP-ARGs) during nitrification in biofilms. The correlations between the abundances of CIP-ARGs and nitrifying microorganisms were also discussed. The results showed that CIP had little influence on the ammonium oxidation process of biofilm microorganisms, whereas inhibition of the nitrite oxidation process was found. The quantitative results of ammonium-oxidizing bacteria (AOB) and nitrite-oxidizing bacteria (NOB) including Nitrobacter and Nitrospira indicated that the inhibition on the transformation of nitrite was resulted from the inhibition on Nitrobacter and Nitrospira. In addition, little influence of CIP on the relative abundance of aac and qepA in biofilms was found, but the influence on parC and oqxB was great. The abundance of Nitrotacter exhibited significant positive correlation with the abundance of parC. Similar significant correlation was also found between the abundances of Nitrospira and oqxB. It could be speculated that the genetic elements of different nitrifying microorganisms in biofilms possibly carried CIP-ARGs.