Efficacy of bioaugmentation with nondomesticated mixed microbial consortia under ammonia inhibition in anaerobic digestion.

Bioaugmentation shows promise in mitigating ammonia-induced microbial inhibition in anaerobic digestion processes. However, the advanced technical requirements and high costs associated with pure strain cultivation, as well as the time-consuming and labor-intensive process of domesticating consortia, present challenges for industrial applications. Herein, the efficacy of bioaugmentation with nondomesticated mixed microbial consortia was evaluated, which resulted in a significant methane production improvement of 5.6%-11.7% and 10.3%-13.5% under total ammonia nitrogen concentrations of 2.0 and 4.9 g-N/L, respectively. Microbial analysis revealed that at high ammonium levels, the bioaugmented culture facilitated a transition in the methanogenic pathway from acetoclastic to hydrogenotrophic by regulating symbiotic relationships between propionate- and acetate-oxidizing bacteria and methanogens. Consortium type and dose applied were identified as crucial factors determining bioaugmentation effectiveness. Overall, nondomesticated mixed microbial consortia demonstrate potential as cost-effective bioaugmentation agents for mitigating ammonia-induced inhibition.

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Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: As Fan Lü, a [co-]author on this paper, is an Associate editor of Bioresource Technology, she was blinded to this paper during review, and the paper was independently handled by Samir Kumar Khanal as an executive editor.