Contribution of molecular microbiology to the study in water pollution removal of microbial community dynamics

Molecular tools based on 16S rRNA geneidentification are revolutioning microbialecology. After a short presentation of theadvantages and drawbacks of these new tools,the paper gives a succinct review of theirpossibilities as they have been applied to themicrobial ecology of water pollution removal.Examples of applications are presented in thefields of anaerobic digestion, nitrogen andphosphorus removal, filamentous bacteria andbioaugmentation. The data provided give someinsights about microbial diversity, populationdynamics, ecosystems stability and specificmicrobial population activity.