The aerobic granular sludge (AGS) process is an effective wastewater treatment technology for organic matter and nutrient removal that has been introduced in the market rapidly. Until now, limited information is available on AGS regarding the removal of bacterial and viral pathogenic organisms present in sewage. This study focussed on determining the relation between reactor operational conditions (plug flow feeding, turbulent aeration and settling) and physical and biological mechanisms on removing two faecal surrogates, Escherichia coli and MS2 bacteriophages. Two AGS laboratory-scale systems were separately fed with influent spiked with 1.0 × 10⁶ CFU/100 mL of E. coli and 1.3 × 10⁸ PFU/100 mL of MS2 bacteriophages and followed during the different operational phases. The reactors contained only granular sludge and no flocculent sludge. Both systems showed reductions in the liquid phase of 0.3 Log₁₀ during anaerobic feeding caused by a dilution factor and attachment of the organisms on the granules. Higher removal efficiencies were achieved during aeration, approximately 1 Log₁₀ for E. coli and 0.6 Log₁₀ for the MS2 bacteriophages caused mainly by predation. The 18S sequencing analysis revealed high operational taxonomic units (OTUs) of free-living protozoa genera Rhogostoma and Telotrochidium concerning the whole eukaryotic community. Attached ciliates propagated after the addition of the E. coli, an active contribution of the genera Epistylis, Vorticella, and Pseudovorticella was found when the reactor reached stability. In contrast, no significant growth of predators occurred when spiking the system with MS2 bacteriophages, indicating a low contribution of protozoa on the phage removal. Settling did not contribute to the removal of the studied bacterial and viral surrogates.

好氧颗粒污泥（AGS）工艺是一种有效的废水处理技术，用于有机物和营养物的去除，已迅速引入市场。到目前为止，关于AGS的信息很少，无法去除污水中存在的细菌和病毒致病生物。这项研究的重点是确定反应器运行条件（塞流进料，湍流曝气和沉降）与去除两种粪便替代物（大肠杆菌和MS2噬菌体）的物理和生物学机制之间的关系。两个AGS实验室规模的系统分别加有1.0×10 ⁶ CFU / 100 mL大肠杆菌和1.3×10 ^8的加标进水。PFU / 100 mL的MS2噬菌体，然后在不同的操作阶段进行跟踪。反应器仅包含颗粒污泥，不包含絮凝污泥。两种系统均显示出厌氧进料过程中液相的0.3 Log ₁₀降低，这是由于稀释因子和生物附着在颗粒上造成的。在曝气过程中，去除效率更高，对于大肠杆菌（E. coli）约为1 Log ₁₀，对于MS2噬菌体而言，去除率约为0.6 Log ₁₀。18S测序分析显示，自由生原生动物属Rhogostoma和Telotrochidium的高操作分类单位（OTU）关于整个真核生物社区。加入大肠杆菌后，附着的纤毛虫繁殖，当反应器达到稳定状态时，发现了Epistylis，Vorticella和Pseudovorticella属的积极贡献。相反，当用MS2噬菌体加标系统时，捕食者没有显着增长，这表明原生动物对噬菌体去除的贡献很小。沉降无助于去除所研究的细菌和病毒替代物。