Response of anammox granules to the simultaneous exposure to macrolide and aminoglycoside antibiotics: Linking performance to mechanism

Abstract Antibiotic pollution is becoming increasingly severe due to its extensive use. The potential application of the anaerobic ammonium oxidation (anammox) process in the treatment of wastewater containing antibiotics has attracted much attention. As common antibiotics, spiramycin (SPM) and streptomycin (STM) are widely used to treat human and animal diseases. However, their combined effects on the anammox process remain unknown. Therefore, this study systematically evaluated the response of the anammox process to both antibiotics. The half maximal inhibitory concentrations of SPM and STM were determined. The continuous-flow anammox system could adapt to SPM and STM at low concentrations, while antibiotics at high concentrations exhibited inhibitory effects. When the concentrations reached 5 mg L−1 SPM and 50 mg L−1 STM, the nitrogen removal efficiency dramatically decreased and then rapidly recovered within 8 days. Correspondingly, the abundances of dominant bacteria and genes also changed with antibiotic concentrations. In general, the anammox process showed a stable performance and a high resistance to SPM and STM, suggesting that acclimatization by elevating the concentrations was beneficial for the anammox process to obtain resistance to different antibiotics with high concentrations. This study provides guidance for the stable operation of anammox-based biological treatment of antibiotics containing wastewater.