Overview of the experimental design to determine if a nitrifying microbial community

An overview of the experimental design to determine if a nitrifying microbial community can use organic nitrogen from eDNA as a nutrient source. Each of the three nitrogen treatments (ammonia only, eDNA only, or a combination of ammonia and eDNA) were inoculated with the nitrifying microbial community in the exponential growth phase (right column) or contained no microbial community (sterile controls, left column) for a total of six experimental treatments. The concentration of eDNA was measured at 10 timepoints over 72 hours to determine the rate of eDNA decay in each treatment.