S4). Neither of these measures showed significant trends over the experiment. However, there were indications from light microscopy that some of the granules lost some structural integrity during the dosing as there was an appearance of fluffier material at days 49 and 58 (Fig. S5). Additionally, selleck chemical there was evidence of an increase in the effluent SS from approximately 100 mg L−1 before dosing to approximately 400 mg L−1 on days 42 and 56 (Fig. S6), suggesting that sludge settling was poorer due to granule biofilm disruption. The diversity

indices derived from 16S rRNA T-RFLP data indicated that there were changes in the community structure over the dosing period, with the Shannon diversity index decreasing over the last 14 days of dosing (Fig. 3). This appeared to be a result of the development of a less even community structure (Fig. S7) rather than the disappearance of particular operational taxonomic units (Fig. S8). While there was therefore some evidence

of a change in the diversity indices, i.e. those describing aggregate community characteristics, Everolimus datasheet there appeared to be little change in the relative abundance of two of the model organisms commonly found in EBPR systems. The relative abundance of a key organism responsible for EBPR, Candidatus‘Accumulibacter phosphatis’ (Hesselmann et al., 1999), was 27.1% on day 0 (92% congruency score) and 22.8% on day 42 (end of 100% OC dosing; 96% congruency score), as assessed ADAMTS5 by quantitative FISH. The relative abundance of a glycogen-accumulating organism and known EBPR antagonist, Candidatus‘Competibacter phosphatis’ (Crocetti et al., 2002), was below 1% on days 0 and 42. This is the first study in which the removal of OC, microbial diversity, nutrient removal performance and granule structure has been tested in a simulated activated sludge system exposed to OC and antibiotics in pandemic-scenario dosing. There was up to 41% removal of OC per 6-h SBR cycle, with the most successful

removal occurring in the first 35 days of dosing. It may be that in a real pandemic scenario, 35 days of significant removal at the beginning of an epidemic would reduce the amount of OC released into receiving waters. However, during the SBR operation, there was no evidence of significant OC removal after day 35. Hence, there does not appear to be sufficient selective pressure for the enrichment of OC degraders in the system investigated. There was no evidence of any adverse effects on reactor performance during the first 28 days of the simulated pandemic (i.e. up to 36 μg L−1 OC, 70 μg L−1 amoxicillin, 30 μg L−1 erythromycin and 10 μg L−1 levofloxacin). There was, however, evidence during and after the two-week high-OC dosing period (days 29–42; 360 μg L−1 OC) of a reduction in EBPR and nitrification, bacterial community diversity and disruption to granule structure.