Engineering Water Infrastructure Microbiomes: Past, Present, Future

Microbial communities in water infrastructure are leveraged for beneficial purposes, such as degrading waste, while they are also targeted for destruction, to control the transmission of waterborne pathogens. Strategies to engineer these microbial communities were developed long before molecular techniques were available to characterize them. In this talk, I will discuss the evolving understanding of water microbiomes in the essential infrastructure that we rely on to provide sufficient quantities of safe water and manage our waste. I will share specific examples from our research to ensure the safety of "one water" systems that are designed to recycle wastewater directly back into drinking water. We have demonstrated that advanced treatment trains employing a wide variety of technologies can eliminate the original microbial community of the wastewater. However, advanced purified wastewater is not sterile and a new microbiome emerges. In our current research, we explore whether this microbiome can be modified by seeding, and hypothesize that engineering the water microbiome is preferable to relying on chance to ensure that a healthy microbiome is established in this new source of drinking water. I will also touch on significant challenges to managing the water microbiome given inequitable access to these basic services around the globe. I will conclude by speculating on the future of microbiome engineering in water infrastructure systems that aim to be resilient to a changing climate and more equitable.