Abstract: As a typical antibiotic pharmaceutical wastewater, berberine wastewater contains high concentrations of refractory and toxic organic pollutants. In this study, a pilot-scale upflow anaerobic sludge blanket-membrane bioreactor (UASB-MBR) system was built for the treatment of berberine wastewater. The system used biochemical reactions to remove high concentrations of organic matter and berberine. The effects of different hydraulic retention times (HRT) were observed, and GC-MS was used to analyze signature organic pollutants (SOP) in the influent and effluent. The results showed that:1) With HRT of 96,4, 72 and 60 h for the UASB reactor, and 66,8, 50 and 41 h for the MBR, and with influent COD_Cr and berberine concentrations of 2030.0-3660.0 and 19.0-400.0 mg/L, respectively, more than 90.0% COD_Cr and berberine removals were achieved. The average effluent COD_Cr and berberine concentrations were lower than 150.0 and 4.0 mg/L, respectively. 2) The HRTs of UASB and MBR were 72 and 50 h respectively for the best operating conditions. 3) By using GC-MS, analysis of the SOPs in the influent and effluent suggested that USAB treatment could significantly reduce the SOPs species and their relative concentrations. After MBR treatment, 11 main organic pollutants in the wastewater could be effectively degraded.