Treatment of antibiotic-manufacturing wastewater enriches for Aeromonas veronii, a zoonotic antibiotic-resistant emerging pathogen

作者：Xingshuo Wang, Meilun Wang, Wei Zhang, Hui Li, James M. Tiedje, Jizhong Zhou, Edward Topp, Yi Luo, Zeyou Chen · 发表于：The ISME Journal · 年份：2025 · DOI：10.1093/ismejo/wraf077 · 被引用次数：16 · 研究领域：Aquaculture disease management and microbiota、Microbial infections and disease research、Bacterial Identification and Susceptibility Testing

Antibiotic-manufacturing wastewater treatment plants primarily target chemical pollutants, but their processes may select for antibiotic-resistant pathogens and antibiotic resistance genes. Leveraging the combined strengths of deep metagenomic sequencing, 16S rRNA gene sequencing, quantitative polymerase chain reaction, and bacterial culturing, we investigated bacterial communities and antibiotic resistomes across eleven treatment units in a full-scale antibiotic-manufacturing wastewater treatment plant processing wastewater from a β-lactam manufacturing facility. Both bacterial communities and antibiotic resistance gene compositions varied across the treatment units, but were associated. Certain antibiotic resistance gene persisted through treatment, either carried by identical bacterial species, or linked to mobile genetic elements in different species. Despite the satisfactory performance in chemical removal, this plant continuously enriched zoonotic antibiotic-resistant Aeromonas veronii (an emerging pathogen responsible for substantial economic losses in aquaculture and human health) from influent to effluent, probably due to prolonged β-lactam selection pressure and aquatic nature of A. veronii. This enrichment resulted in a significantly higher abundance of A. veronii than other aquatic samples worldwide. Furthermore, the closest evolutionary relative to the retrieved A. veronii was an isolate obtained from the stool of a local diarrhea patient. These findings highligh...