Nutrient level determines biofilm characteristics and the subsequent impact on microbial corrosion and biocide effectiveness.

Nutrient level determines biofilm characteristics and the subsequent impact on microbial corrosion and biocide effectiveness. Appl Environ Microbiol. 2020 Jan 24;: Authors: Salgar-Chaparro SJ, Lepkova K, Pojtanabuntoeng T, Darwin A, Machuca LL Abstract The impact that nutrient level has on biofilm characteristics, biocide effectiveness and the associated risk of microbiologically influenced corrosion (MIC) was assessed using multispecies biofilms from two different oilfield consortia. A range of microbiological, microscopy and corrosion methods demonstrated that the continuous flow of nutrients for the microbial growth resulted in higher activity, thickness and robustness of the biofilms formed on carbon steel, which induced greater localised corrosion compared to biofilms formed under batch, nutrient-depleted conditions. Despite of the differences in biofilms characteristics, biofilms displayed comparable susceptibility to glutaraldehyde biocide with similar log10 reduction and percent reduction of microorganisms in both nutrient conditions. Nevertheless, nutrient replenishment impacted the effectiveness of the biocide in controlling microbial populations; a higher concentration of cells survived the biocide treatment in biofilms formed under a continuous flow of nutrients. Complementary DNA and RNA-based amplicon sequencing and bioinformatics analysis were used to discriminate the active within the total populations in biofilms est...
Source: Applied and Environmental Microbiology - Category: Microbiology Authors: Tags: Appl Environ Microbiol Source Type: research