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Antibiotics in Water and Wastewater and Their Effects on Microbial Communities

A special issue of Water (ISSN 2073-4441). This special issue belongs to the section "Water Quality and Contamination".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (28 February 2023) | Viewed by 16629

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
Department of Microbiology, University of Agriculture, Kraków, Poland
Interests: antibiotics in water; antimicrobial resistance, bacterial biodiversity; water quality; water ecosystems in mountain areas
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Nowadays, it is impossible to imagine the modern world without chemical agents, including antibiotics, which in the 20th century were considered a miraculous discovery of medicine. However, the consequence of their widespread use and abuse, as well as improper and non-intended use, is their presence and spread in the environment, particularly in aquatic ecosystems. Their durability and mobility in the environment allow them to penetrate from sewage treatment plants and household and agricultural sewage, along with surface runoff, into natural waters, including shallow and deep circulation groundwater. Although the observed concentrations of antibiotics are often not harmful to humans, their sub-lethal concentrations contribute to increasing bacterial resistance to these substances and alter the microbial community’s composition. It has been demonstrated that an inflow of a variety of contaminants into water resources, including antimicrobial agents and/or allochthonous microorganisms, is a worldwide problem.

Therefore, this Special Issue aims to broaden the existing knowledge on the occurrence, concentrations, and spread of antimicrobial agents in aquatic ecosystems, as well as in wastewater and treatment plants, along with their impact on the microbial community’s composition, diversity, and functions.

I invite you to submit a manuscript focused on, but not limited to, one of the following topics:

  • the distribution of antimicrobial agents in aquatic ecosystems (surface water and groundwater),
  • the occurrence of antibiotics in wastewater and wastewater treatment plants,
  • the impact of antibiotics in water and wastewater on microbial populations,
  • the distribution and spread of antibiotic resistance in aquatic ecosystems,
  • the applicability of various laboratory techniques in the detection of antibiotics and antimicrobial resistance determinants in water and wastewater.

Dr. Anna Lenart-Boroń
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • antibiotics
  • antimicrobial agents
  • antibiotic resistance
  • aquatic ecosystems
  • bacterial population
  • microbial pathogens
  • wastewater
  • wastewater treatment

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Review

29 pages, 440 KiB  
Review
Assessment of Existing Fate and Transport Models for Predicting Antibiotic Degradation and Transport in the Aquatic Environment: A Review
by Temesgen Zelalem Addis, Joy Tuoyo Adu, Muthukrishnavellaisamy Kumarasamy and Molla Demlie
Water 2023, 15(8), 1511; https://doi.org/10.3390/w15081511 - 12 Apr 2023
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 3137
Abstract
In recent years, the use of antibiotics for human medicine, animal husbandry, agriculture, aquaculture, and product preservation has become a common practice. The use and application of antibiotics leave significant residues in different forms, with the aquatic environment becoming the critical sink for [...] Read more.
In recent years, the use of antibiotics for human medicine, animal husbandry, agriculture, aquaculture, and product preservation has become a common practice. The use and application of antibiotics leave significant residues in different forms, with the aquatic environment becoming the critical sink for accumulating antibiotic residues. Numerous studies have been conducted to understand antibiotic removal and persistence in the aquatic environment. Nevertheless, there is still a huge knowledge gap on their complex interactions in the natural environment, their removal mechanism, and the monitoring of their fate in the environment. Water quality models are practical tools for simulating the fate and transport of pollutant mass in the aquatic environment. This paper reports an overview of the physical, chemical, and biological elimination mechanisms responsible for the degradation of antibiotics in natural surface water systems. It provides an in-depth review of commonly used quantitative fate models. An effort has been made to provide a compressive review of the modeling philosophy, mathematical nature, environmental applicability, parameter estimation, prediction efficiency, strength, and limitation of commonly used environmental antibiotic fate models. The study provides information linking paradigms of elimination kinetics and their simulation in the antibiotic fate models aiming at critical issues regarding current model development and future perspectives and to help users select appropriate models for practical water quality assessment and management. Full article
25 pages, 1568 KiB  
Review
Impact of Antibiotic Pollution on the Bacterial Population within Surface Water with Special Focus on Mountain Rivers
by Klaudia Kulik, Anna Lenart-Boroń and Kinga Wyrzykowska
Water 2023, 15(5), 975; https://doi.org/10.3390/w15050975 - 3 Mar 2023
Cited by 43 | Viewed by 12908
Abstract
Environmental aquatic pollution with antibiotics is a global challenge that affects even pristine mountain environments. Monitoring the concentration of antibiotics in water is critical to water resource management. In this review, we present the sources and degradation routes of antibiotics polluting surface waters, [...] Read more.
Environmental aquatic pollution with antibiotics is a global challenge that affects even pristine mountain environments. Monitoring the concentration of antibiotics in water is critical to water resource management. In this review, we present the sources and degradation routes of antibiotics polluting surface waters, with particular focus on mountain environments and pristine areas. This pollution is strongly related to anthropopressure resulting from intensive tourism. An important aspect of the threat to the environment is water containing antibiotics at sub-inhibitory concentrations, which affects bacterial populations. Antibiotics are ecological factors driving microbial evolution by changing the bacterial community composition, inhibiting or promoting their ecological functions, and enriching and maintaining drug resistance. We paid attention to the stability of antibiotics and their half-lives in water related to biotic and abiotic degradation, which results from the structures of molecules and environmental conditions. Wastewater treatment combined with advanced treatment techniques significantly increase the efficiency of antibiotic removal from wastewater. Modern methods of wastewater treatment are crucial in reducing the supply of antibiotics to aquatic environments and enhancing the possibility of economic and safe reuse of wastewater for technical purposes. We provide a perspective on current research investigating antibiotic emergence in mountain areas and identify knowledge gaps in this field. Full article
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