Characteristics of planktonic and sediment bacterial communities in a heavily polluted urban river

Abstract

Urban rivers represent a unique ecosystem in which pollution occurs regularly, altering the biogeochemical characteristics of waterbodies and sediments. However, little is presently known about the spatiotemporal patterns of planktonic and sediment bacterial community diversities and compositions in urban rivers. Herein, Illumina MiSeq high-throughput sequencing was performed to reveal the spatiotemporal dynamics of bacterial populations in Liangtan River, a heavily polluted urban river in Chongqing City (China). The results showed the richness and diversity of sediment bacteria were significantly higher than those of planktonic bacteria, whereas a strong overlap (46.7%) in OTUs was identified between water and sediment samples. Bacterial community composition remarkably differed in waters and sediments. Planktonic bacterial communities were dominated by Proteobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Cyanobacteria and Actinobacteria, while sediment bacterial communities mainly included Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria, Chloroflexi and Bacteroidetes. Additionally, several taxonomic groups of potential bacterial pathogens showed an increasing trend in water and sediment samples from residential and industrial areas (RI). Variation partition analysis (VPA) indicated that temperature and nutrient were identified as the main drivers determining the planktonic and sediment bacterial assemblages. These results highlight that bacterial communities in the polluted urban river exhibit spatiotemporal variation due to the combined influence of environmental factors associated with sewage discharge and hydropower dams.