Food waste composting with wood chips: preliminary analysis of the bacterial and fungal communities

Abstract

Wood chips represent an important component in improving the composting of food waste by contributing to the optimization of the carbon/nitrogen ratio and providing porosity and aeration of the mass, which are determinant factors for proper aerobic fermentation and maturation processes carried out by microbial communities. This work evaluated the taxonomic complexity and functionality of the microbial communities associated with the composting process of three different w/w (wet weight) ratios of food waste and wood chips using traditional isolation methods and high throughput sequencing techniques (HTS). Results highlighted differences in the presence of specific taxa associated with certain ratios. The obtained results make a substantial contribution to understanding microbial dynamics during food waste composting.