Impacts of microaeration on the anaerobic digestion of corn straw and the microbial community structure

•The effect of limited oxygen daily supplied on the AD of corn straw was studied.•Daily oxygen supplied could obviously improve the AD performance of corn straw.•Specific methanogenic activity under microaerobic condition improved slightly.•The microbial community structure shift could explain the better AD performance.

Conventionally, oxygen is considered as inhibit factor of anaerobic digestion (AD). However, recent studies have demonstrated that AD performance could be enhanced by introducing limited amounts of oxygen (or air) directly into the anaerobic digester or during pretreatment step. In this study, impacts of microaeration on the anaerobic digestion of corn straw and the microbial community structure were investigated. Results showed that limited air introduced into fermentation system could improve the methane yield of corn straw. Maximum cumulative methane yield of 216.8 ml/g VSsubstrate and maximum VS removal efficiency of 54.3% were simultaneously obtained under microaerobic condition with the air load of 12.5 ml/LR per day, which were 16.5% and 10.3% higher than those of sample under anaerobic condition, respectively. Compared to anaerobic condition, the relative abundances of phylum Firmicutes, class Clostridia and order Clostridiales, which associated with hydrolysis process of AD were raised under microaerobic condition. In addition, the relative abundances of oxytolerant Methanosarcina and Methanobacterium were both doubled under microaerobic condition. Accordingly, specific methanogenic activity (SMA) under microaerobic condition improved slightly. The microbial community shift might be the reason for improved AD performance under microaerobic condition.