Titel (eng)

Probabilistic fecal pollution source profiling and microbial source tracking for an urban river catchment

Autor*in

Julia Derx   Vienna University of Technology

Andreas H. Farnleitner   Vienna University of Technology / Karl Landsteiner University of Health Sciences

Alfred P. Blaschke   Vienna University of Technology

Matthias Zessner   Vienna University of Technology

Ernis Saracevic   Vienna University of Technology

Regina Sommer   Medical University of Vienna

Gabrielle Stalder   University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna

Julia Walochnik   Medical University of Vienna

Gerhard Lindner   Vienna University of Technology

Alexander K. T. Kirschner   Medical University of Vienna / Karl Landsteiner University of Health Sciences

Jack Schijven   Utrecht University

Christina Frick   Vienna City Administration

Sílvia Cervero-Aragó   Medical University of Vienna

H. Seda Kılıç   Vienna University of Technology

Rita Linke   Vienna University of Technology

Verlag

Elsevier

Beschreibung (eng)

We developed an innovative approach to estimate the occurrence and extent of fecal pollution sources for urban river catchments. The methodology consists of 1) catchment surveys complemented by literature data where needed for probabilistic estimates of daily produced fecal indicator (FIBs, E. coli, enterococci) and zoonotic reference pathogen numbers (Campylobacter, Cryptosporidium and Giardia) excreted by human and animal sources in a river catchment, 2) generating a hypothesis about the dominant sources of fecal pollution and selecting a source targeted monitoring design, and 3) verifying the results by comparing measured concentrations of the informed choice of parameters (i.e. chemical tracers, C. perfringensspores, and host-associated genetic microbial source tracking (MST) markers) in the river, and by multi-parametric correlation analysis. We tested the approach at a study area in Vienna, Austria. The daily produced microbial particle numbers according to the probabilistic estimates indicated that, for the dry weather scenario, the discharge of treated wastewater (WWTP) was the primary contributor to fecal pollution. For the wet weather scenario, 80-99 % of the daily produced FIBs and pathogens resulted from combined sewer overflows (CSOs) according to the probabilistic estimates. When testing our hypothesis in the river, the measured concentrations of the human genetic fecal marker were log10 4 higher than for selected animal genetic fecal markers. Our analyses showed for the first-time statistical relationships between C. perfringens spores (used as conservative microbial tracer for communal sewage) and a human genetic fecal marker (i.e. HF183/BacR287) with the reference pathogen Giardia in river water (Spearman rank correlation: 0.78-0.83, p < 0.05. The developed approach facilitates urban water safety management and provides a robust basis for microbial fate and transport models and microbial infection risk assessment.

Sprache des Objekts

Englisch

Datum

2022

Rechte

Dieses Werk bzw. dieser Inhalt steht unter einer
CC BY 4.0 - Creative Commons Namensnennung 4.0 International Lizenz.

CC BY 4.0 International

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Klassifikation

Animals; Humans; Rivers; Water Pollution Analysis; Water Microbiology; Cryptosporidiosis; Escherichia coli; Environmental Monitoring Methods; Cryptosporidium; Feceschemistry; Giardia; Water Analysis

Mitglied in der/den Collection(s) (1)