The Impact of Water Intrusion on Pathogenic Vibrio Species to Inland Brackish Waters of China

Qingyao Wang, Songzhe Fu, Qian Yang, Jingwei Hao, Can Zhou and Ying Liu
Additional contact information
Qingyao Wang: College of Marine Technology and Environment, Dalian Ocean University, Dalian 116023, China
Songzhe Fu: College of Marine Technology and Environment, Dalian Ocean University, Dalian 116023, China
Qian Yang: Center for Microbial Ecology and Technology (CMET), Ghent University, Coupure Links 653, 9000 Gent, Belgium
Jingwei Hao: College of Marine Technology and Environment, Dalian Ocean University, Dalian 116023, China
Can Zhou: College of Marine Technology and Environment, Dalian Ocean University, Dalian 116023, China
Ying Liu: College of Marine Technology and Environment, Dalian Ocean University, Dalian 116023, China

IJERPH, 2020, vol. 17, issue 18, 1-14

Abstract: The estuary is the ecological niche of pathogenic Vibrio spp. as it provides abundant organic and inorganic nutrients from seawater and rivers. However, little is known about the ecology of these Vibrio species in the inland brackish water area. In this study, their co-occurrence and relationships to key environmental constraints (salinity and temperature) in the Hun-Tai River of China were examined using the most probable number polymerase chain reaction (MPN-PCR) approach. We hereby report 2-year continuous surveillance based on six water indices of the Hun-Tai River. The results showed that seawater intrusion maximally reached inland as far as 26.5 km for the Hun-Tai River. Pathogenic Vibrio spp. were detected in 21.9% of the water samples. In particular, V. cholerae , V. parahaemolyticus , and V. vulnificus were isolated in 10 (10.4%), 20 (20.8.5%), and 2 (2.08%) samples, respectively. All V. parahaemolyticus strains were tdh gene negative, 10% were positive for the trh gene. Multi-locus sequence typing (MLST) divided V. parahaemolyticus strains into 12 sequence types (STs) for the Hun-Tai River. Five STs were respectively present in various locations along the Hun-Tai River. The PCR assay for detecting six virulence genes and Vibrio seventh pandemic island I and II revealed three genotypes in 12 V. cholerae isolates. The results of our study showed that seawater intrusion and salinity have profound effects on the distribution of pathogenic Vibrio spp. in the inland river, suggesting a potential health risk associated with the waters of the Hun-Tai River used for irrigation and drinking.

Keywords: seawater intrusion; Vibrio parahaemolyticus; Vibrio cholerae; MLST; virulence factor (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/18/6781/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/17/18/6781/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:17:y:2020:i:18:p:6781-:d:414974

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().