Physicochemical water disinfection methods result in the reduction of bacterial concentrations by orders of magnitude, but not in the total elimination of the bacterial community. As such, the dead bacterial biomass may act as a carbon and nutrient source for the survivor populations. The ability of bacterial strains to grow on dead bacterial cells has been described before as necrotrophy. We investigated the impact of killed bacterial biomass of two different bacterial strains on the growth potential of natural drinking water microbial communities. Many indigenous bacterial taxa could grow on dead biomass, with the total bacterial concentration increasing from 10⁴ to 10⁸ cells/ml. Necrotrophic growth was specific (43 enriched taxa) and selective (i.e. enriched taxa were dependent on the type of dead biomass). The potential of natural water communities to grow necrotrophically has remained underexplored. Nevertheless the phenomenon can have a big impact in water quality and deserves more attention.

物理化学水消毒方法可将细菌浓度降低几个数量级，但不能完全消除细菌群落。这样，死亡的细菌生物质可以充当幸存者群体的碳和营养源。细菌菌株在死亡细菌细胞上生长的能力之前已被描述为坏死。我们调查了两种不同细菌菌株杀死的细菌生物量对天然饮用水微生物群落生长潜力的影响。许多本地细菌类群可以在死生物量上生长，细菌总浓度从10 ⁴增加到10 ⁸细胞/毫升。坏死性生长是特定的（43个富集的分类单元）和选择性的（即，富集的分类单元取决于死生物量的类型）。天然水群落坏死性生长的潜力仍未得到开发。然而，这种现象可能对水质产生重大影响，值得更多关注。