Author ORCID Identifier

https://orcid.org/0009-0000-2678-0234

Semester

Fall

Date of Graduation

2025

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Type

MS

College

Eberly College of Arts and Sciences

Department

Biology

Committee Chair

Timothy Driscoll

Committee Member

Rita Rio

Committee Member

Gordon Smith

Abstract

Severe acute respiratory syndrome corona virus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) enters human respiratory cells through binding of its spike (S) protein to the ACE-2 receptor, which is highly expressed in lung cells, but is also found in over 150 other cell types encompassing major organs including GI enterocytes. SARS-CoV-2 causes gut dysbiosis in infected individuals and patients with COVID-19 and also coincides with lower alpha diversity of the individual’s gut microbiome. Certain gut microbiome-associated genera are lower in abundance in COVID-19 patients including Lachnospira, Prevetolla, Roseburia, Bifidobacterium, and Faecalibacterium while genera such as Bacteroides, Enterococcus and Proteobacteria are increased during a SARS-CoV-2 infection. With evidence showing various diseases including COVID-19 impact human GMB diversity, it stands to reason that these effects could be seen in a wastewater system due to the human fecal input into the system. However, the degree to which humans influence the wastewater microbiome directly has not been studied in depth and is unknown if changes to a community’s health would be readily displayed and identifiable by changes to wastewater microbiota.

In this study, wastewater based epidemiology methods were utilized to monitor human gut microbiome associated bacteria of over 200 wastewater samples from 8 different communities of various populations in West Virginia during periods of high and low concentrations of SARS-CoV-2 present in the wastewater at the influent point of the community’s associated wastewater treatment plant (WWTP). Our findings show a general trend of lower alpha diversity at the species level during periods of high SARS-CoV-2 in the community (Inverse Simpson p=0.046, Shannon p= 0.027, Richness p=0.100). Smaller population WWTPs appeared to be more sensitive than larger population WWTPs when profiled separately, although the larger plants were more diverse in general. We also investigated changes in abundance to the above mentioned bacterial genera during the same periods of high and low SARS-CoV-2 concentrations and found that the Bacteroides followed the same trend seen in human stool samples. To our knowledge, this is the first study directly linking human gut microbiome trends to the wastewater microbiome to this degree.

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