Department of Environmental Science & Analytical Chemistry (ACES), Stockholm University, Stockholm, SE-106 91, Sweden.
Aquabiota Water Research AB, Stockholm, SE-115 50, Sweden.
Environ Microbiol. 2018 Aug;20(8):2796-2808. doi: 10.1111/1462-2920.14120. Epub 2018 Apr 30.
In aquatic ecosystems, microplastics are a relatively new anthropogenic substrate that can readily be colonized by biofilm-forming organisms. To examine the effects of substrate type on microbial community assembly, we exposed ambient Baltic bacterioplankton to plastic substrates commonly found in marine environments (polyethylene, polypropylene and polystyrene) as well as native (cellulose) and inert (glass beads) particles for 2 weeks under controlled conditions. The source microbial communities and those of the biofilms were analyzed by Illumina sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene libraries. All biofilm communities displayed lower diversity and evenness compared with the source community, suggesting substrate-driven selection. Moreover, the plastics-associated communities were distinctly different from those on the non-plastic substrates. Whereas plastics hosted greater than twofold higher abundance of Burkholderiales, the non-plastic substrates had a significantly higher proportion of Actinobacteria and Cytophagia. Variation in the community structure, but not the cell abundance, across the treatments was strongly linked to the substrate hydrophobicity. Thus, microplastics host distinct bacterial communities, at least during early successional stages.
在水生生态系统中，微塑料是一种相对较新的人为基质，可以被生物膜形成生物轻易地定殖。为了研究基质类型对微生物群落组装的影响，我们将环境中的波罗的海细菌浮游生物暴露于海洋环境中常见的塑料基质（聚乙烯、聚丙烯和聚苯乙烯）以及天然（纤维素）和惰性（玻璃珠）颗粒下 2 周，在受控条件下。通过对 16S rRNA 基因文库的 Illumina 测序分析了源微生物群落和生物膜群落。与源群落相比，所有生物膜群落的多样性和均匀度都较低，这表明基质驱动的选择。此外，与非塑料基质上的生物膜群落相比，与塑料相关的生物膜群落明显不同。虽然塑料上 Burkholderiales 的丰度高出两倍以上，但非塑料基质上的放线菌和吞噬菌的比例明显更高。处理之间的群落结构变化，而不是细胞丰度，与基质疏水性强烈相关。因此，微塑料至少在早期演替阶段宿主细菌群落具有独特性。
