Abstract: As the rapid development of economy, the environmental problem of the toxic refractory pollutants has been increasingly serious. By now, biological treatment is the most frequently used method, in which bioaugmentation is the best technology to cope with the refractory pollutants. However, its efficiency is not reliable. Some foreign researchers found that certain genetic elements could automatically transfer or exchange between different microbe individuals, which they called as horizontal gene transfer. In this way, the transfer of degradative gene from the donor to the indigenous microbes could increase the number of adaptable microbes greatly in the polluted site, therefore the degradation of the pollutants were strengthened. Those findings inspired a new thought for alternating the traditional bioaugmentation to solve the serious pollution caused by refractory pollutants. This paper describes the concept of horizontal gene transfer, introduces the research progress applied in the pollution treatment, and also discusses its prospect in the treatment of the toxic refractory pollutants.

Key words: horizontal gene transfer (HGT), mobile genetic elements (MGEs), refractory pollutants

摘要： 随着经济的发展，有毒有害难降解污染物引起的环境问题变得越来越严重。对于这类污染物的处理多采用生化处理方法，其中生物强化技术是目前较好的方法，但是它也存在强化效果差、处理效率低等问题。国外研究人员发现：遗传物质可在不同的生物个体之间或单个细胞的内部细胞器之间自发进行交流，称为水平基因转移。在污染体系中，降解基因的转移能够使土著菌获得降解新功能，从而强化对难降解污染物的处理，这就为现有的生物强化技术提供了一种解决难降解污染问题的新思路。介绍了水平基因转移的概念以及将其应用于污染治理中的研究进展，并分析了技术发展前景。

关键词: 水平基因转移, 可移动遗传因子, 难降解污染物